Sweet chariot
by Setsuna-cutey
Summary: Struggling with herself and her relationship with Darkwing, Morgana reopens the door to Dream World. The story has a slight postmodern/surreal edge. Spoilers for Ghoul of my Dreams/Dead Duck.
1. Chapter 1

**A.N. **Inspired by _Ghoul of My Dreams_ and _Dead Duck_. Most of this fanfic was written slightly after the second novel of _The Duck Knight Returns_ was published. It became clear to me then that I really wanted to write something personal from Morgana's point of view that could somehow address the problem in her relationship with Darkwing that was somehow more true to the canon. By bridging the episodes and building a story line on them, I hope that I have achieved this. I'll upload the story in parts, hopefully a chapter a week, so I have time to look at the chapters again and revise them. I hope you enjoy it. If you did, please comment. If you are a fan fiction writer yourself, you know how much a word can mean.

**Sweet Chariot **

I

She had substituted her dreams with his. Each night, the same nightmare came back to haunt her. Not one of her own, but a figment of his imagination. A vision that had repeated itself until it had become a habit, like breakfast with black coffee, like flipping through the spell book each morning, like putfting on that particular purple eye shadow for no one. It was the same, uninspiring, sad dream and she knew that one day, it would wear her out completely. Her imagination had run dry, a waste land of nothingness and sameness. She was always propelled into the same dream state. Each night, and each day, she found herself stuck while he was slipping away. In the dream, Morgana could reach out to him, and lord knows she tried, but her fingers were too slender, too slippery, too long. He was like sand, moving its way through the cracks. She had to let him go. In the end, that was what it always came down to, letting go. Apparently that had to come with a nauseating feeling each time.

She found herself awake in the middle of the night, heart pounding, throat sore. The guilt she felt was unbearable. It took her some time to realize it had all been just that, a dream, that very same dream, nothing more. Nightmares tend to leave their marks and this one had been particularly nasty. On top of that, she had to relive it more than once. Of course, Morgana had always enjoyed the more morbid aspects of living. She had grown up as a monster and had always favoured that culture over Saint Canards where she spent most of her life living at night. Still, this dream was darker than the darkness she cherished. In it, she slowly let go of Darkwing while he walked into his afterlife. He had given up on life and said his goodbyes. He disappeared. She couldn't prevent it. It usually ended when she stretched her arms, trying another magic spell on his feathers, but he, a ghost, remained still, untouched. He was transparent, sheer emptiness, could not even be compared to a whisper, a tremor of air or a breath of wind. The image had been strong, had left an impression so cruel that she wondered if she'd ever get rid of it.

Morgana knew it was his dream because she had seen it ages ago when she went through the door to Dream World again. Nodoff had long been defeated, but the door was still open to date and sometimes, she could not help but taking a stroll there and peeking into the dreams of others. One particular night she had stumbled upon one of Dark's nightmares when he was sleeping in his house. She often found herself wishing they were together at night but he was always too busy being a superhero and spending his time at home with Gosalynn and Launchpad. He preferred to sleep at home and never wanted her to say over. 'Because of Gosalynn,' he had explained her once. She didn't blame him for taking care of his kid, trying to be a good father, but it irked her. They had been dating for some months by now and he constantly filtered her out. It left her feeling powerless. Maybe the dream had been spot-on. She could not stand up for herself because she was so afraid to lose him. And in his dreams, he lost her too. If they hadn't been apart, she could have comforted him back then, but she had to leave Dream World and had wandered back to her own bed.

In the nightmare, Dark had passed away and there was not a spell in the world she could fathom that could somehow bring him back to life. There was too little time. He said his goodbye's and asked Launchpad, specifically, to take care of Gosalyn, and told her how much he regretted that they hadn't had more time together. She could have fabricated a thousand spells then and there but it could never be enough. Some facts of life are beyond magic. It had sickened her. Simultaneously, she had realized the limits of her powers, her own incapability to help out which was all the more increased by her intense, loving feelings towards him. At the same time, she had felt his sadness. It had scarred her, this experience, to feel this much and to be able to do so little. Perhaps the dream world had influenced her more than she thought. Perhaps she was living more in her imagination than in reality by now.

Staring at the empty streets of Saint Canard, she placed her hand on the cold window and tried to get a grip on herself. Was she overreacting? Not quite and not yet. Still, she couldn't help but feel occupied with the dream and that fear she had to loose him. She clung to the curtains as she would to his cape. He was far off with his family, one that she was no part of. She could not simply write herself into his life just by observing him. She could not let him go, either.

0

'This is a poor foundation for our relationship,' she spoke to her pets that morning. 'I can just venture into his dreams like that but I see so little of his actual emotions. Perhaps we talk too little. Perhaps I'm a little afraid to discuss our issues as well.'

She listened to the reply of her pets as she would to any magical creature. To an outsider, it would have looked ridiculous but to her, they were family. Darkwing may have Gosalynn and Launchpad, she had them. 'Nonsense, Eek, I don't have intimacy problems.' She emphasized. 'And I do know my boundaries, Squeek! Well, I have to admit it's a bit of an invasion of his privacy but I've only passed the dream door twice to look at his world.'

Squeek moved his wings rapidly. 'No, it's not like that.' He kept on flapping. 'Well, I do know the dream world can blend dreams of different individuals. I remember how Darkwing and I were in it earlier and could manipulate it. He ended up in my dreams as well, but this time, I didn't really… ' If Squeek could have sighed, he would have. 'The difference is that I was _me_ in _his_ dream. I'm sure I could have acted otherwise but it felt like I was really taking part in it, you know. I was at his mercy, affected by his imagination. I had that a few times when I entered the dream world with Nodoff as well. Still, it was kind of odd to experience his side of the dream as well, even if it was just a little.'

In response, Archie held out his tongue disapprovingly. 'Sometimes you just know when you feel someone else sadness and not just yours! Geez, we live near a graveyard, visit a funeral for once!' Squeek sighed while Morgana played with her breakfast quite literally which existed out of a few lizards that still seemed very much alive. 'Well, that is why I went into the door in the first place! Of course I want to know how the dream world works. I want more information, see what it's like. And that I stumbled upon one of Darkwing's dreams, so be it.'

The pets all shook their heads and Archie clacked his tongue. 'I won't do it again, alright?' Morgana stood up and left her breakfast for what it was. The pets exchanged a meaningful gaze with each other and a glare at Morgana. Anyone at this point could have observed they had gotten used to her fits but never let these prevent them from telling her the truth.

Morgana knew that they were partly right about her actions but what had affected her to do this, they would never know. Love was a different matter for their species than for hers. And making her feel guilty over the matter would not work either. She already felt that and it was eating her up. She knew that without much ado Dark would reject her if he ever found out. 'Once a villain, always a villain' was his favourite idiom and this surely fit into what he considered to be a legally gray zone. 'If all fails, I'll tell him I did it to protect us. Because that door is in my house, a house he visits. Lucifer forbid, he, or Gosalyn, would ever step into it by chance and gets warped into Dream World.' She nodded and seemed quite sure of herself.

She tried to experiment with magic to get rid of the dream. In her living room, she conjured up spells that would make her sleep easier and trigger the imagination. She tried to sleep afterwards and woke up in tears. The magic didn't work. When she met Dark later that night – he was so busy, still in a fight with Negavolt who had escaped to a power plant – he left her after a kiss and the brief message that he really, really couldn't make it for dinner. 'I'll make up for it, Morg, my love,' he spoke before driving off in a hurry. 'Sure, sure,' she muttered, 'like always.' Sparks of magic branched from her fingers, the only visible signs of her irritation because she looked so tired. Something had to change in their relationship.

The few books she had on dreams, magic and psychology all emphasized the same thing. That her unconscious was getting the better of her and that, in order to change these sleeping problems, the problems in her real life that caused them had to be solved. Easy as pie, she could just try to talk to him. Except that, most of the time, Dark wasn't really the talkative type and neither was she.

0

When her pets were asleep the night after, she went into the door of Dream Land again. This time, it was particularly foggy, a void of white as far as the eye could see. Sometimes, images appeared. She stepped further, into a dream that might have been Gosalynn's. A little girl jumped over buildings, fighting in a green outfit, against the fearsome five. Another one appeared to be Bushroot's, in which he talked to a woman that appeared to be a colleague. They both wore lab coats and experimented on a giant rat. It was interesting how many of the dreams she stumbled upon were related to people she knew. Perhaps it was impossible to envision or see the dreams of those you had not met. Or perhaps they were less up fronted. She kept on walking, passed Launchpad's dream of the Hungry Hippo, passed the Muddlefoots camping in a psychedelic swamp.

Eventually, a dark dream caught her attention. In it, she saw herself running and tripping in the streets of Saint Canard. Above her, gigantic random objects hovered – tea pots, kettles, a pillow, an hour watch - and Nodoff, controlling them, laughed loudly. The shadows of the objects peered over her. She felt anxious, fired magic spells and tried to get up. It was too late. 'Don't,' she heard herself say before she turned away. Her heart skipped a bit when she woke up. She was in the nexus in Dream World but not by herself.


	2. Chapter 2

A.N. Early update. ^_^ Hope you enjoy it! (Comments are always appreciated!)

II

The endless fog formed a landscape that was nearly entirely white. Behind her, someone coughed. It had a distinct giggle to it.

'Do you like it?' Nodoff was trying to provoke her.

'Not in particular. I prefer black.'

'You haven't changed a bit. Surprised to see me again?' She turned around with an air of confidence, as if she did not fear him. The truth was that ever since he had overthrown her, she had often found herself thinking about him. Sure, he was petty ghoul but he had some powers and a particular kind of irrationality and illogic behind his actions that made him dangerous. Nodoff's grin seemed broader than ever.

'Not really. I knew it was inevitable though, granted, I would have rather prevented it. Then again, it's not like you can harm me. We are in the nexus. I am asleep and awake at the same time.'

'Morgana, my dear, it's good to have you back. And what an interesting philosophical statement about my Dream World, darling! Let me give you some additional facts: When we are awake, we also dream. Most of the time, our subconscious is active. Those images you just wandered into are mine. It's interesting to observe, isn't it? You can also take part in it.' He pretended to push her and laughed. 'Come on, it's nice to see old friends again, isn't it? Especially when you nearly killed them in the real world!'

'Nodoff,' she spoke coldly, magic bursting out of her hands.

'Your tricks don't work in my land, you know that, right?'

'I thought you were gone.'

He cackled. 'Me, gone? You locked me here! And you came back, just like that, voluntarily! Honestly, what _were _you thinking?'

'That I'd explore that door one more time and that Dream World is a pretty big place where I wouldn't necessarily bump into you. Just to be sure, I learned a few new spells and I figured; you can only influence me when I am dreaming.'

'You are so bold. I am very surprised this seemed like a nice outing to you. You are walking right into my danger zone. Dear Morgana, let me make one thing clear to you. That you are dreaming doesn't mean I can't hurt you. '

'I think you'll find it does.' She raised her hand, sizzling with magic, into the air and blasted him off. 'You know, I was always stronger than you. This is why you worked for me. I won't make any mistakes again. I cast charms when I go to bed and have little keepsakes that keep me safe. I'm not afraid of you anymore.'

'You are too curious for your own good,' he sniffled, rubbing his nose, on which he had just landed. He cracked his hand and casted a few spells on her but it didn't do the trick. 'So what exactly do you hope to find here?' She warded off his spells, wondering how they would affect her here, in this netherworld.

'Insights,' she said, 'a bit of knowledge about our imagination, our psychology. A bit of ease and relaxation.'

'You were getting bored, weren't you?'

'So very, very much.'

'And your darling boyfriend, isn't he a good pastime?'

'He's grown a bit uncaring.' She blocked a spell of his and he ran off, hiding in the fog.

'Really?'

'Really. I want to know what he's thinking,' she said, looking for him.

'And you are doing it the elaborate, witchy way. Well, Morgana, I approve of it, I must say.' He walked out of the veil of mist while she impatiently sighed.

'I want to know more about this Dream World, Nodoff. If I'd understand it better, I'm sure I could use it somehow.' She caught him in a bubble of magic that he popped with a small spell. 'You must enlighten me a bit. Honestly, we don't need to fight. There isn't much you can do to me or that I can do to you. We live in separate worlds. You hate my world; I'm not planning on taking over yours.'

'Still, I would never tell you anything about this world that could be to my disadvantage,' he grinned. 'But what can I say? It consist out of the figments of our imagination. It's a little trip to our unconscious. Morgana, believe me, spending too much time here would drive you mad. Like me.' He flew into the air a bit and cackled. 'No, you wouldn't want to live here.'

'Then could you at least tell me this,' she asked, 'why does a dream I saw here haunt me still? Every night, I can't get it out of my system.'

'That's the return of the repressed, Morgana,' he answered. 'What you saw confronted you with your ego, your self. You try to deny it but it haunts you. I would have to know a bit more about it to tell what exactly it was.'

She remained silent.

'You know, the benefit of living here for a long time is that I know your dreams. I see all the dreams of Saint Canard's. Don't tell me - Wait for it! - This is the one in which Darkwing dies, isn't it? Instant classic!'

'Nodoff,' she called out sharply.

'I can show you what you desire, what you really dream, and then perhaps you know what to do.'

'Don't tempt me.'

'Instead of a nightmare, you'd have a jolly good time sleeping.'

'So you can manipulate me again? I don't think so.'

'Suit yourself, _mistress_.'

'I have to go, Nodoff.'

'You want my advice? Either talk to Darkwing or grow some spine. You are anything but incapable. Let him know this.'

'It's not about incapability.'

'But it is about your own insecurity, isn't it?'

Morgana ignored his comment by turning around and walking off. She had had enough. He was pushing his luck, this ghoul! Insecure was surely not something she'd ever define herself as. She hadn't heard that word since a very long time. The last years, she had run a successful business, had bought a great mansion (alright, it was a family heirloom, but still!), gotten some nice pets. It seemed she was doing just _peachy_. She had grown a lot of spine throughout the years, why, she had a perfect backbone! What did that Nodoff know anyway? Her hands, now fists, gave off little electric beams. Yes, Morgana Macawber was a perfect witch and she could be even more perfect, if she just got a good night's sleep for once! Behind her, someone was less convinced. Nodoff looked at the fog, analyzed it, saw shapes reflected in the fog that remained hidden for her. It was like he was peering straight into her subconscious, straight into her heart.

Nodoff was provoking her again. 'You know I'm right. You are still that little girl, Morgana. I know all about you. The loneliness of growing up. The pain of being divided. That sad, sad world you live in. And I know you'll be back.'

'I won't be back, Nodoff,' she said, reaching out for the door of Dream Land.

'You will be. You live for dreams. You pine to have your imagination back. What else is there in this world? Where else can you hide? And who else understands you but me, your dear, dear servant, Nodoff?' She stood still, only for a moment. He was so spot-on it hurt. ' Your boyfriend doesn't know half of it. The racism you had to endure, your daddy issues. And don't even get me started about the boredom and insecurity of staying at home after your dynamically daring and dangerous villain career. For a woman like you, that must be real tough. But my dear lady, I would still be delighted to work for you. Let's conjure up a nice scheme together, for old time's sake!' There was a matter of seconds between his offer and her reply. She could not help but consider it.

'Stop begging,' she snapped. 'You've seen what the real world is like. Bitter, solid, unimaginative. It's my home, though. I'll go back, and I think you'll be just fine by yourself, Nodoff.'

'But will you be?'

She stood still for a minute, hesitating to open the door. It was so tempting to stay here, lurking, exploring but never truly feeling a thing. That's the good thing about Dream World, it cuts of your emotions until you are awake and then they hit you, she realized. That's why we wake up when we die or when someone hurts us. We are startled but we only cry once we are awake. Well, most of the time.

'I'm not that person anymore,' she said softly. 'This comes with living, all of it. That's reality. And this is imaginary. I've learned the ropes.'

'How hurt you must be,' Nodoff said but Morgana slammed the door behind her but still catching that last comment, that tempting remark. 'You need me, Morgana!'

'No, you need me, you pesky critter.'

0

Morgana was in her thirties. When she stepped out of that door though, she felt young, insecure, hurt. These were feelings she often had to hide. When she was younger, her mother had always told her that things would get easier. Whenever she was feeling down, mom had made her a cup of 'nightshade', a dark drink that Morgana had always enjoyed and that gently tucked the pain away. Whenever she could not get her hair right, complained about school or felt she could not perform her spells properly, mom had taken her through a door that ended up in a long stairway. She would tell little Morgana to climb it and feel proud. Each time, after she had passed the many stair cases, she had to open the door. It led to a small magical cupboard that contained an item. It was always a constant surprise what she found there, hidden in a blue or purple box, but she knew that all of the times, her mother had magicked it there. And most of the times, it was something totally dull, like a box of crayons or just her dolls mom had hidden. That didn't matter though. It was the journey that mattered, the surprise, the confidence, the adventure. It was not unlike stepping into Dream World. There is something nice about your own house being a bit of a mystery to you.

Surprise was something that she had missed after her mother had passed away and that she, even now, still associated with her. It was a way of encouraging her daughter by happy, little things, small remarks and extra bits of motivation. Morgana had developed stronger because of her mother. Often, mom would tell her that the insecurities would go away with age, arguing that you grow stronger and more resilient as an adult. She had told little Morgana many things. She had been optimistic.

Scratch that, a liar. There are certain pains you choose that you can't differ from and that shape who you are. Like your mother passing away, the kids bullying you in school, the feeling that you might be different and the knowledge that you are. The truth is that you have to learn to live with the idea that you are insufficient and have to cope with the insecurity that comes with life. It's a heavy weight, that's for sure. You do not become sterner or stronger the older you get. You get a bit smarter, maybe, but parts of you also dumb down. You do not take on an ideal shape. People are not rocks that are sculptured throughout their lives. They start out with a little core and become even more fluid until they eventually scatter across the globe. You leave traces of you wherever you go. Time crumbles these little bits of you until there is nothing left. You do not become richer; you become barer.

At times, she convinced herself that she was being cynical and could continue for a few days without gloom or doubt but in the end, she knew it was true. These are all the chances you get and they are not enough, so not enough. In the end, you got to choose. It's either this or that. It's either living with him or without him. That´s what learning to let go was all about: letting a few things slip, especially the possibilities that might have been and dreams that could not have been. She leaned against the closed door to Dream World. This was an impasse, a time of reflection. She had to find out what not being a villain could be like and that meant _acting _like a non-villain. She simply could not get through her days experimenting a bit with spells and waiting for Dark. She had to find out what her life could be like.


	3. Chapter 3

A.N. Thanks for the readings and the favourites, everyone. I am happy that you enjoy the story and appreciate the support and interest. Now, let's find out how Morgana's doing and yes, Darkwing is in this chapter too. Enjoy!

**Chapter 3 **

Sighing, her hand petted the door to Dream World. Her pets, who had been waiting for her, lurked in the corner, stared at her. If looks could kill, she would've dropped dead right then and there. 'Sweeties, I needed to. I'm so sorry. I don't know what to do with myself anymore.'

Archie shook his head. Morgana walked to the kitchen with him. 'Want something to eat?' He refused the flies she gave him. She seated herself down at the dinner table.

'I think I should visit Dark, what do you think?' Archie stuck out his tongue: he didn't care for Darkwing much. 'I'm not so sure myself.' She could never explain it to him. Her mind had all of these dark corners, filled with obscure objects that made her trip. It was so much easier to ignore it all, put it away in some cupboard and never look back. Eek rested on her shoulder, a comforting wing poking in her neck. 'Sometimes love is not enough, dear,' she whispered. 'I should tell him.' The bat flew up. 'What? No, not that! If he knew about Dream World, he'd be skeptical again, he'd think I'd go all villain on him again! We don't want that.'

She raised her hands, conducting a spell and a magic orb appeared like a hole punched in the sky. It showed him as Drake, doing the dishes. He was looking at the clock at times.

'This is when he usually suits up for business,' she explained to her pets. 'I don't want to interrupt him.' Archie frowned.

'I'm not spying on him that much,' Morgana said. 'You know what? Squeek, honey, come here.' The bat flew towards her. 'I don't want to come across too needy.' Archie protested even more but Morgana ignored him. 'Why don't you bring Darkwing a message?'

She wrote a quick letter that she missed him, pressed a kiss on it, and tied it to Squeek.

'Good thing you're a big and strong bat, huh?' Squeek nodded and flew off eagerly. The other two pets were less excited. 'Come on, at least Squeek's supporting me in my romance!'

Then again, Squeek tended to get excited about a lot of things.

0

That night, she laid out her tarot cards. The hand was not bad – the empress was in it and the tower, in a good way - but the chariot was quite prominently positioned. This made the reading a bit more complicated.

'It's about getting what you want,' she told her bats and spider. 'It's about struggling for what you want. The chariot, more than any of the other cards, represents our dreams and desires and what we are willing to do for them.'

Eek pointed at the empress, upside down. 'It's not particularly positive. There is change involved though, when you look at the reading rightly.' Archie sighed.

'Well, it's tarot, Archie. It's never precise.' He pulled out his tongue.

'Don't tell me I shouldn't have given up divination! In my defense, I had a horrible teacher. And I am just peachy without fortune telling. It's just to be on the safe side, you know.' Squeek pointed at the band of angels again. 'What I have to do, I think, is follow some path but there is destruction involved, inevitable. That's the tower. I cannot prevent it. I can only resolve. That's that one. There's resolution in the end, but only then.' She peered at the moon. 'I'm sure it will be alright. And it's tarot, so there's multiple readings. You only know the future is upon you when it has happened, right?' She petted Eek, looking for reassurance. His thin fur felt a bit cold and his wing just a bit more leathery and inflexible than normal. She got anxious now.

0

It was barely midnight when he showed up. She had hidden the cards but the chariot, not so much, it was still on the kitchen table. She couldn't put it away and looked at it, as if staring at it deeply would solidify its meaning somehow.

'Morg,' he said, taking of his hat. After that, he gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. How could she ever begin to explain to him what she was going through? 'I've missed you.'

'Missed you more, Dark dearest,' she said. 'How is your night going?'

'Well,' he said when they walked towards their favourite table at the graveyard, 'exciting. Megavolt and Quakerjack had teamed up again and taken over a power plant - nothing your dastardly daunting Darkwing Duck couldn't handle though! I prevented that electric energizer and toy tinkerer from committing -' He poked at the food the bats were serving. 'Hm, is this alive again?'

Morgana nodded. 'Yes, I know, you prefer it fried,' she flamed his plate with magic. 'There you go.' No reason to argue about this again, though she did not understand his tastes at all and thought the food looked rather iffy like this. It tasted so much fresher when it was raw.

'Sounds like you had a great night,' she said.

'And how was your night, dearest Morg?' he asked her, patting her hand. 'Was there any specific reason you needed to meet with me tonight?'

'A bit… well… You know me… Some magic and…' she hampered. 'Oh, who am I kidding? Dark, dearest, I'm bored out of my mind!'

'Bored, you? That's a first! You always seem so bright and busy. Even when you're in your mansion all day, you always conjure up a new spell of some kind. And with all those sneakily-hidden secret rooms, it can be a pain just finding you when I drop by unannounced!'

'That's not it, Dark. Not actual boredom as in that I have nothing to do or to explore, but rather that I everything I do seems to lack meaning. Without my villain career, what am I? How do I get through my day? No evil company to run, no one to boss around, no office supplies to jinx, no rare evil artifacts to hunt down at flee-bay!'

'Morgana, I hope you are not implying you're thinking of switching sides again?' Dark called out.

'No, no! I would never! But I have to admit, I'm just not sure what to do with myself these days.' She clasped his hand tighter. 'I loved being a hero with you, especially when we teamed up as Justice Ducks a while ago. Finally I had something to do, a sense of purpose, a sense of adventure. I miss it, Dark. A girl can only keep herself busy with spells for so long.'

'Perhaps when we fight as Justice Ducks again, you can –'

'Oh,' she spoke anxiously, 'but when will that be, Dark, if at all? You seem like such a loner and that's how I prefer you. I don't want to intrude.'

'Still, I have to admit I liked our Justice Ducks team and I'm sure that when the time comes, we can reunite.'

'But it's more of a special squad, right? I mean, most of us have our own jobs and life. Think of Gizmoduck, for instance, he's from way out of town. And I'm okay with all of that.'

'Well, I'm sure there'll be tasks in the future I can't do by myself, Morg. Still, that doesn't give you much structure now, does it? Maybe you can work on your magic a bit? It seems to be a bit off lately.' Dark ate a bit of his fried lizard, not aware of any insulting implications in his talk. Morgana twitched a little.

'And you would know all about magic, wouldn't you?' she snapped. 'Well, any errors you may have spotted in my otherwise flawless performance have been because I've been feeling so down. Ever since I switched sides, my motivation's a bit lower.' She did not mention the insecurity, the sleeping problems or secret doors in her house leading to worlds much more inspiring than this one.

' Aha!' He pointed at her. 'Maybe the villain in you is secretly sabotaging me!'

'Dark, you know I would never!'

'Maybe subconsciously, you don't want us to win any fights! Maybe subconsciously a part of you still gets a kick out of changing me into a moose, or pudding for that matter!'

'Oh really? Perhaps subconsciously I think you are being a twat. And _consciously_, I think you may want to consider leaving my graveyard!'

'Come on, Morg, it wasn't meant as a –'

She zapped him. 'You think I need to work on my magic skills, huh? Well, take this! And that!'

'Morg, come on! You asked me what to do!'

'You just don't understand, do you?'

'Hold the magic for a minute. How do you want me to respond to this, really?'

'Like my boyfriend. Help me think about this new life for a minute, instead of constantly referring to my past at any chance you get.'

'So let's think about it. There must be jobs out there that are not villainous or –'

'I think you should leave,' Morgana said, harshly.

'But I – '

'Just go. I can't have you suspecting me all the time. If even you don't trust me, love, how am I ever supposed to keep this up?' Morgana faced the ground. The muscles of her pale face tightened, anger mixed with sadness. There was a void in her, a bleakness he could not understand or relate to. He was so full of himself, so sure of what she was like.

'Oh, Morg.' He touched her arm gently and it felt so warm, so good, so natural that she almost fell for it again. It was anything but healthy.

'The fact that you always project these things on me, always misunderstand me, hurts me more than you'll ever know. You who loves me the most, knows the least.'

'I understand the effort, what you are doing, I'm just - .'

'No, you don't. Dark, dearest, I need some time and you too. I think it's for the best. And when you come back, I want you to have faith in me.' Dark, his hat clutched between his hands, nodded. His eyes seemed sad, something that she had never seen before, except this one time, months ago, in a distant dream. She knew he had never loved anyone more. He had told it to her many times, how happy he had been when he had met her, how fascinating and beautiful she was, how a night with her was never boring. She always noticed how he relaxed when she touched him and he could be everything he was, Drake, Dark, just a guy, really. Their relationship was straining but also soothing in a way. When he walked away and stepped on his motor cycle, he seemed a bit broken, but he waved to her and nodded. She knew that she would see him again, more whole and perhaps, more trusting. If only it didn't hurt that much.


	4. Chapter 4

A.N. I loved writing this one. Also, it creeps me out how much Nodoff has grown on me. There's just so much you can do with that character.

**IV**

'He fears you,' Nodoff whispered, curling the clouds with his magic, grinning from side to side. She had entered Dream Land again that night. She had cried so much it was only natural. Just one good dream, just a bit of rest, she had told herself. 'It explains the nightmares, everything. You are so much stronger, you restrain yourself so much. He knows this. You are so much more than the woman he is dating. You are holding back.'

'I am.' Morgana looked numb, drained from the restless nights, but her mind was still sharp. She looked confident.

'That's why the nightmare is so true. You're afraid you are regressing instead of going forward. His fear becomes your fear.'

'I led it guide me. I adapt to him.'

'You adapt too much. A relationship is all about compensating.' Nodoff walked around, a pipe in his hand, a tweet suit, dressed up like Freud himself. 'Yes, Morgana, you did the right thing being apart with him for a little while.'

'It's nothing big.'

'I saw it. I know what you felt and said. He dreamt about it, you know.'

'You saw that…'

'All I can say is - work on your magic. Don't downplay yourself.'

'I need to walk,' she told him. 'I need to clear my mind so that I can sleep again.'

'I have one good remedy, if you want it, if you really need to sleep.' He handed her a small beg that was tied to his belt.

'Sleeping powder,' she said without opening it. 'I don't do that anymore.'

'You'll make it to my land and I'll give you beautiful dreams, I promise, nothing too serious. You'll also feel much better yourself. When you use the powder, your dreams will be magical, nothing like those devious fabrications that haunt you all the time.'

'No.' She tried to give it back to him.

'Keep it, in case you change your mind.'

'I'd never.'

'Who knows? You are so interested in this world and its rules, might as well get some hands-on experience, right? There's magic you can use to keep control of your dreams, in case I would ever try to outwit you.'

'Nodoff, there's plenty of things you can do, I saw that the last times. The minute I passively enter Dream Land, I'm at your mercy.'

'Perhaps, still, a dream is always your story. I'm only a ghoul. There's only so much I can do. I have no interest in your world anymore or in you.'

'Revenge,' Morgana emphasized. 'There's so much reasons for you to hate me.'

'My grudges are not as deep as yours.'

'I wonder.' She took the sleeping powder nonetheless, promising herself that she would store it and never open it. She could be confident, yes, but she could also be persuaded if it was in her best interest.

0

Without Nodoff, Dream Land was an inspiring place. It felt warm, like being in bed with a night lamp on and sweet, like the melodies of a lullaby. The fog was dense at times and then, mild again. Morgana had always hated swimming but knew for sure this was what drifting and floating was like. It was everything that she had ever imagined the world to be. Concepts of others flickered by, moments of inspiration, droughts of those who were feeling uninspired. She felt she took a dip in a collective mind, a place where everyone is equal, and equally shares his hopes and aspirations.

Sometimes, she imagined words or possibilities of a life that could be, a great job as a career woman again, with her own business. Perhaps sell magical goods to superheroes or products that citizens of St. Canards could benefit from? Or start a restaurant specialized in Monster food, for those that were interested in new culinary experiences? Eventually, she could envision herself marrying Darkwing, or at least giving him a key to her house, living at two places at once with a magical door in-between, maybe, just maybe she could even magically mend their houses together. They would have daily routine, taking care of Gosalynn in the morning, making tea for breakfast, both of them still tired from a night of work, then Drake would maybe go to bed again and she would work on her company or business or restaurant or whatever-she'd-have. They would have a family life and a kind of structure. She would enjoy being normal like the Normal she never was.

Still, there was something nice about not being like that, not now, not ever. Those Normals and their weird habits were undoubtedly the cause of those gray locks of hair she'd had ever since she was in her early twenties.

Dream Land became a pattern, a habit. She didn't want to enter it but every other week, and then every other day, it gave her comfort. It was a place where there was no distance between him and her, where everything she wished came true. It was an aesthetic experience, over and over again.

0

Enter it.

Forget it.

Learn to breathe a little bit.

Let it go.

Somewhere, Nodoff was grinning.

0

One day, the door to Dream Land was open just a little bit. It was only a crack. The light shimmered into the mansion but Morgana was floating in the clouds somewhere. Her pets, outside, must have been worried because they had entered Dream Land to warn her. Yes, it could very well be that little Gosalynn had been looking for her, that she wanted her to make up with her poor old daddy. Too bad Morgana realized this too late when Archie peeked through the door and called her name. The arachnid dribbled towards her on his eight feet. Did he see what she saw, there in the clouds? Did he see her holding Gosalynn in her arms, as if she was her own daughter? Did he understand what she needed? Probably not. He frowned and called out that Gosalynn was coming, and that was when Morgana's eyes opened wide.

'Gosalynn, what's she doing here?'

Archie pointed, tried to explain she needed to talk to her. 'Whatever for? Is it about Dark and me?'

The spider nodded quickly and pulled her skirt.

'Alright, I'm coming, I'm coming.'

They walked into a different dream scape where the fog became hazier with a glow of purple, like the advent of twilight or maybe the end of a long night. Morgana was pale as the moon there, her eyes searching the non-images. Archie, upset by this void, crawled up her legs to her shoulder, whispering that she needed to hurry.

'I feel Gosalynn's already here,' Morgana told him. 'The place feels foreign, there's definitely an intruder here.'

They found an image eventually. It was mostly voices. Words at points, whispers she could barely make out until they closed in on them.

'Grandpa, why?' she heard Gosalynn ask. 'Where are you?' The purple turned into a corridor without an end. They walked through Gosalynn's voice, her questions, her doubts, her fears. It was gut wrenching, really.

'She's been through a lot, Archie,' Morgana said to comfort her pet, well, actually to comfort herself. 'Such a tough girl, so strong, never showing any of this.'

'Mom, dad,' little Gosalynn muttered. Her voice was so quiet, so off-beat.

Accidents happen. _All the time_. Morgana knew that because her own mother had died just like that in an unfortunate event, just a bit of misused magic and snap, she'd passed away. It didn't take long to end a life, and it sure as hell didn't take much. Her dad had raised her since she was twelve. Gosalynn though, she was completely alone. No mom, no dad, no granddad. It just happens all the time. Just like that.

'Gosalynn, dear?' Morgana called out. Archie asked her something she did not want to know.

'I'm not sure if you can get trapped in your own nightmares here. I'm very conscious when I enter this place through the door, as opposed to when I use sleeping powder and am at Nodoff's mercy. Perhaps Gosalynn, because she is so young, cannot control the dream space yet.'

Archie sounded skeptical.

'I guess it could be that her imagination is that dark, but she plays so kindly at points.' Archie shook his head again.

'Competitive, you think? I've never seen a kid with so much energy. I refuse to believe that, Archie. Just because you are so cynical, doesn't mean that I – Oh, look at that.'

They had found a door in the left wall of the corridor. It was small, just the right height for Gosalynn. Morgana crouched through it. 'Gos?' The room was suspiciously dark, but in the centre of it, Taurus Bulba seemed to be standing and then disappearing again. The dream scape changed a bit. Like a videogame, it showed little blocks tossing and turning in the corner. That was where Gosalynn was sitting. She was staring at them, maybe even controlling them. The little blocks were here puppets.

'I don't want to become part of the dream,' Morgana said, and she repeated herself until it was a whisper, 'I don't, I, I'm me.' A constant mantra. 'You will have to keep me conscious, Archie, whatever happens. Poke me. Talk to me. Do whatever you can. I'm not sure what's happening here, but we'll have to prepare.'

Morgana moved up to Gosalyn. The game pixels took on the shapes of words.

Dark. Family. Horror. Funeral. Death.

'But I'm Gosalynn Mallard now, I'm okay,' the kid spoke. She rearranged the words. Dark became brighter and so did family. The others became vaguely transparent. Then they started to close in on her.

'Gosalynn, dear, can you hear me?' Morgana asked. No reply. She put her hand on little Gosalynn's shoulder. She seemed so small right about now. The words - Dark. Family. Horror. Funeral. Death. – started to change. Some letters were scratched away until it said.

.a.. ….l. .o…. ..n…. .e…

'Sweetheart, it's going to be alright. You are not alone.'

She hugged the little girl. The dream scape remained cold.

'You can't ever be what they were. They were so smart. They gave me chores and structure and homework. I was so… I was never mad. They took care of me. And granddad, he would always sing to me.' The letters started to glow in the colours of the song her grandfather had taught her. 'No one can ever replace him. And no one ever should.'

'We would never replace your parents, Gosalynn. How could we even?'

'It will never be the same again.'

'I guess not, but Drake tries, he really does,' she told her. 'I know that maybe he can't always give you the attention you need but he cares about you so much. Just between us girls, do you know how many times he stood me up for you?' She gave Gos a little nudge.

'I don't want to enjoy living with him,' Gosalynn suddenly said. 'I should hate it.'

'Why?'

'I don't want to forget grandpa or my parents; I don't ever want to see them replaced.'

'Oh, sweetie.'

'Every day, their faces get a little lost, you know… How could I ever - ? Especially grandpa, he becomes so blurry. With my parents, I mean, I was younger. But grandpa, it was just a few days ago and then suddenly, it's like bam, a year.'

'Sometimes, it helps to look at some of the things that remind you of him, you know.'

'I have all the things he gave me, all of them, but they don't remind me of him anymore. It's so distant somehow. Maybe I can't remember, maybe I don't want to.' Morgana had never heard Gosalynn talk so sincere or mature. The Dream Land affected her in a peculiar way. The colours took on the shape of her grandfather but without any distinctive features, without a face.

'You know him better than this,' Morgana said, peering at the silhouette. 'Come on, Gosalynn, you still remember him. Don't you want this? He's here, with you. Use your imagination!' Some traces began to appear but it felt off, somehow.

'It isn't him, Morgana,' she whispered. 'This is all a lie.'

'Do you know this isn't real?'

'I guess, but I can't do much about it.'

'Can you get up? We need to get out of here.'

'What is this place?' Gosalynn asked. 'I thought I was walking into your bed room or something!'

'Dream World, this is your subconscious talking to you, honey.'

'Don't call me honey,' she snapped and she seemed just a little bit more like herself.

'Okay, okay. Now why did you come and look for me? I told you, never go into my house all by yourself! It's haunted, some of the rooms I don't even enter by myself!'

'I came because dad needs you, Morgana. You need to go see him,' she said. 'He's so lonely. I can see it in his eyes. That's why I came. I took the bus.'

'He would be so upset if he knew. You are so young and public transport – '

'Oh, come on! It's no different than the school bus!'

'But still.'

They had gotten up and were slowly making their way through the room. Videogame like characters led the way.

'Don't ever tell him what you saw,' Gosalynn said. 'Or what I said… I'll be fine. It's good to have a new dad. I mean, it's nice in a way.' Morgana chose not to comment.

'Tell me about those game characters.'

'That one is from the Gizmoduck game. It's pretty recent, have you ever played it? Anyway, you finally get to play Gizmoduck and then you-!' she started to actively talk about it. The dream took on a different shape, much brighter, much more detailed. Side-characters from the game started to greet them.

'If Dark knew about this, he'd demand a game too,' Morgana laughed.

Gosalynn grinned. 'He sure would!'

'And so would I!' a sharp voice called out. 'Hello ladies!' One of the NPC's face had changed. Nodoff was peering right at them. 'Now, I'm very interested in this little girl here. Morgana, apparently I can't affect you, but I have been able to distill the worst nightmares out of her. I've seen her in your dreams.'

'I thought you were beyond revenge, Nodoff?'

'Hmmm, let me think. _No_. Not when the right time comes. This is definitely a chance. I'm through with you, Morgana. You are not my play thing anymore, but this little kid here… that's a different matter! Such sadness, such visions to torment. And such a nice way to get to you and Darkwing Duck.'

Morgana shot magic spells at him immediately. 'You'll have to get through me first.'

'Fine,' Nodoff said, and he grew four times his size. 'Let's play then, but by my rules!'

Morgana's spells still had some affect but she had to maneuver herself around him. 'Archie, you take Gosalynn to the door! Hurry!' Archie and Gos both said something she couldn't place because she was too busy hitting Nodoffs right foot.

'Run, damnit! I'll be fine!' Morgana's hands were blazing.

'Oh, it tickles!' Nodoff mocked when the spell hit him, his gigantic foot nearly trampling her.

'Morgana, there's a wall here,' she heard Gosalynn call out. 'There isn't much we can do!'

'I can shape it all,' Nodoff warned her. 'So you can take your pick. And the fact that you are here corporally helps a lot. See, you are fixed. I am fluid, imaginary. You are solid. Give me the girl.'

'Never.'

'Fine, then I'll take her. It's no use in killing you first.'

Morgana concocted a large tornado in the air that blew Nodoff away from Gosalynn.

'At least my magic still works here!'

'Can you make yourself grow? I think not.'

'No, but I can make you shrink,' she blew a spell at him until he was the size of Gosalynn.

'And I can make you pay,' he snapped and with a large gust of wind, he blew her to the wall. It all happened so fast she couldn't react. She fell and the world turned upside down.

**B**

**L**

**A**

**C**

**K**


	5. Chapter 5

**A.N.** Thanks for the reviews, Loony! Hope all of you enjoyed the chapters until now as well.

**V**

In what seemed like a few minutes she came to again. It could not have been too long, she figured, because she had not dreamed, had not fallen prey to Nodoff herself. Or had she? That was the first thing she thought about. _Please don't let me be in Dream World, please don't let me_ – and then, she remembered Gosalyn. Where was she?

Morgana had woken up just behind the door to Dream Land. Her head hurt. Nodoff had kicked her out, undoubtedly. When she opened her eyes and scanned the environment, Archie wasn't there but her bats were resting near her. Squeek's wings moved ever so slowly.

'Ouch, my head.' Morgana was in a daze. Everything seemed so out of focus. Like Gosalynn's image of her granddad, faceless, haunting, just a memory.

'Mother,' was the other thing she managed to bring out. Those pale white arms that held her in the bath tub. Those same pale white hands preparing dinner. Stupid, small memories, you could squeeze them into a micro-second and they would be the same image. Always the same image stuck in your mind that didn't last longer than a rapid eye movement when you dream. That's all that you remember of people you spend years with, a squint. It's horrible, really. She knew Gosalynn's pain all too well, a pain that hits you when you realize that even your own mind starts to betray you, that past things are really gone, that you let go, not because you wanted to, but because you were forced too.

'Where's Gosalynn?' she asked Eek, while Squeek fluttered towards the door.

'Still in there, huh?' Morgana wiped away a strain of hair that stuck to her forehead. 'And Archie too? Aha. What can we do?'

Squeek, bursting with energy, wanted her to go in immediately. Eek wanted her to go warn Darkwing and explore what magic would be most effective to ward off Nodoff.

'You are right, Squeek. The longer Gosalynn is in there, the more chances there are she gets hurt. Still, Eek, I think you got a point. The minute I march in there again, Nodoff might be less merciful. I need to know how to hit him hard. Do I go in dreaming, with the advantage that I can imagine her out of there? Do I go in with my body, with the chance that I'll get hurt, but with my magic?' She bit her tongue.

'It's frustrating.' She stood up, tried to make way to the kitchen in a daze. 'Still dizzy,' she moaned while her bats tried to catch her to no avail. Eventually she managed to get medicine against the headache, but not without walking into the wrong door thrice.

The bats told her to phone Darkwing, that he had a right to know. She thought about that for a minute, didn't want to do it at all. She could just hear him saying it. How it was all her fault again. It made her feel all queasy again. During all of her adult life, Morgana had hardly ever cursed. Daddy had raised her to be lady like and she had liked being lady like. Even when her temper was bad, she kept to this etiquette. At some point, it wasn't a manner of cultural education anymore, but a matter of will and choice. To relief herself from all the stress though, she aimed her magic at an old black vase that had belonged to her great-great aunt. Bother, she had been annoyed by that thing for years. It hardly matched her drapes. After that, she shot frustrated at some of the trees outside. Then, she sat down, more relaxed and picked up the phone her bats had handed her.

The bats dialed his number because she was still afraid to call him. Finally, he picked up.

'Dark, there's something I need to tell you…'

'Morg! How are you? Listen, I've been thinking…'

'That's not why I'm calling. Look uhm…'

'Morg, you sound a bit soft? Are you ill?'

'I'm fine.'

'Well, you sure don't…'

'Dark, listen to me. Are you at the hide-out or at home?'

'Hide-out, LP was babysitting Gosalynn, I needed to go away for a while. I hoped that maybe… I thought Bushroot…'

'You needed to get away there for a while, I get it.'

'No, of course not,' he said hastily, 'why would I want that?'

'Dark, I know you better than anyone. And you, you know your daughter better than anyone. Leaving her with Launchpad wasn't such a great idea after all.'

'What do you mean….? You… Oh, she's at your place? I get it, I'll come get her. She's a bit… She's…'

'Dark, darling, I wish it was that simple.'

'Of course it is, I get on the bike, and then – '

'She just got kidnapped by Nodoff.' There, said it, before the emotions got out of hand, before she would have more trouble speaking to him. She didn't hear him reply at all. Not even a curse? Was she still in a daze? It surprised her that she had started crying; she only noticed that when a tear dripped from her cheek onto the phone. If only she hadn't gone into Dream World, so many if only's, so much guilt, added up to by the pixel-shaped guilt that Gosalynn had experienced. Finally, a voice.

'That ghoul? I thought that door had been sealed?' He sounded like iron bars or like branches in the wind. Heavy, thin, upsetting.

'I may have overemphasized the sealing part.'

'Morg…' His voice trembled. Branches rubbing over branches like violins.

'Look, just get over here, please,' she wiped away a tear. He must have heard it, that or the tremor of her voice because his tone changed.

'I'll be there. How could I not?'

'We need a plan. I can go in there, but it's pretty complex an I'm not sure if I can…'

'Don't worry.'

She nearly hung up the phone when he said: 'Morg, you know that I love you, right?' She didn't say anything because the tears started to cloud her view. It had been a while since she had last cried. She usually responded by ignoring her feelings or acting cold or mad. 'Oh, Dark. Be fast, if she'd get hurt, I could never…'

'She's too curious for her own good, just like her father. I'm at the bike now. See you soon.'

0

It took him half an hour to get here, but it seemed like ages. She paced through the room anxiously and occasionally sat down again because she was still feeling slightly dizzy. Her pets sometimes pressed her back in her seat with a soft nudge, reassuring her, taking care of her. Little could be done. Morgana wondered about the limits of the magic she had been brought up with. It ran through her veins like blood but it seemed poisonous now. The same magic that had gotten her into this mess in the first place would have to get her out of it, save Gosalyn and do some good for once. Meanwhile, Archie seemed to blame her everything. He liked Gosalyn, didn't want to see her get hurt either. The little girl fed him flies every time when she visited Morgana.

'I know you said it, Archie, don't rub it in my face.' Archie seemed grouchy.

'Just stop it, okay, mister perfect?'

It struck her, while waiting, that the distance between her and Dark covered more than two houses and more than a daughter. It was a communication gap or maybe even an existential gap. They came from very different cultures. She could never truly explain the way she felt or what she needed to do because he simply could not always show compassion or understanding for that. He brought out the best and the worst in her. And now their quarreling had put Gosalynn in danger. That's something she'd never forgive herself for.

'If only we fought less than this wouldn't have happened. I care too much about him, in fact, I constantly try to define myself according to him,' she spoke to her bats. 'It's foolish and unnecessary. I should remain myself.'

Archie, resting on her lap, opened one eye.

'I compensate enough,' Morgana glared at him. 'Too much, even.' Archie, however, thought it was the other way around, that maybe she compensated too less where it mattered and maybe forget to speak up where she could.

Squeek flew up. 'Yes, I am feeling less dizzy. The library, you say? You are right. Every minute counts at this point. Let's go.'

Morgana told her pets that they would have to look for any spell that could wear off ghouls, that was vaguely related to dreaming or dealt with using magic in imaginative spaces. She sent Eek and Squeek off through a magic portal to visit the library at her father's house, which was considerably larger than her own.

'Hurry! And if you get back, and Dark and I are already in the door, I need you to follow us. I'll leave Archie here just in case.' She said her goodbyes to her bats and then looked at her book collection, spreading several more general publications out on the table.

'Archie, I need you to skim the indexes of these while I look for more specific titles.'

While she scanned the backs of her books she realized that she was already up to date with a few of them, which she had read before re-entering Dream Land. Many of them were not particularly useful, so she hoped the bats would come up with something.

'What do I specifically need?' she muttered to herself. 'I need to break it down, because I already looked for Dream Land itself and for magic used in dreams and in your fantasy. The titles that discussed it were too generic.' She climbed up a ladder to check the top shelves. 'Specifically, I need a life line, a connection to reality in case we wander too deeply into Dream Land or get tricked or trapped by Nodoff. That needs to be something that can steer our bodies out of Dream Land, or, if we enter it through a dream, that can wake us up again. Like in those ancient myths, something you hold onto that makes you conscious again.'

Archie muttered. 'What else, yes, well, the best thing would be a weapon against Nodoff, but how can you defeat a ghoul like that? He's almost a dream or concept himself. Particular forms of imaginative magic would have my preference if they exist at all.' She flipped through countless of texts but the words hardly got through to her. To know where to look, you first need to know what you are looking for. The words, the concepts, failed to make sense to her.

'I need to outsmart Nodoff, I need to outthink him. Imagination, that's the key weapon here. Set up some sort of barrier that he can't enter. Dream something he can't deconstruct.'

She didn't even hear him enter. When she looked up from the book, page 291 to be exact, on the subject of aerial magic, he was kind of just there. She clutched onto the pages, held them near her heart tightly. He seemed tired in the moon light, that old, dim glow.

'I'm so sorry, Dark.' He shook his head. She loved him so much she wished she could have swallowed him whole. That had happened in his dreams before, she remembered.

0

The sound was heartbreaking. He skimmed the pages to find something useful and sighed softly, an indication that he was making no progress whatsoever. She could not concentrate anymore. With each of his sighs, he felt guiltier. 'Give me five more minutes,' was what she had said. He had tried to help out and so did Archie, to no avail.

'We should give it up. We should go,' he said.

'Not without a plan, we won't, said she. 'Of course, Eek and Squeek will need to be able to track us. We need to have spells, some sort of back-up.'

'Oh, please, I'm Darkwing Duck, master of maneuvers. I usually make it up when I go along, I mean, I'm an inborn superhero and I…' his tone shifted a bit. 'Much depends on this.'

'A little too much.'

'A plan, a quick plan.'

'Help me think, then. If we can shape the dream space anyway we like it, then this will be a piece of cake.'

'When we entered it last time, we could.'

'We slept into it,' Morgana emphasized. 'That's different. It means you fall asleep and that what you see is partly your own dream. Hm, come to think of it… I still have some of that sleeping powder, but it's dangerous. We'll be on equal foot with Nodoff.'

'And if you walk into it, you are not?'

'I can use magic then, but how it affects you, I'm not sure. '

'So you can only use magic if you enter through the portal? That doesn't make sense, Morg. I remember that you did that as well when you were asleep last time. What's the actual difference between sleeping in or walking in?' Dark looked skeptical.

'That Nodoff controls what we see and what we get. Our inner desires, our inner fears.'

'When you sleep in, you are at his mercy, you mean?'

'More or less. At least I am. With you, I can imagine that sleeping in would be better so your body wouldn't get hurt. For me, I mean… I am stronger when I walk through that door.'

'Morg, you might not like what I'm going to say, but I think I will enter it with your sleeping powder. It prevents me from getting hurt and in case something happens in the real world, that Nodoff leaves Dream World again or maybe even traps us there, one of your pets might still be able to wake me up.'

'It could be that we will be in different dream spaces because of this.'

'That's a risk I'm willing to take. Maybe it's even better so that both of us stand a chance against him.'

'But Dark, how will you fight him?'

'Well, since I don't find anything in your books, I'm thinking along the lines of using my natural talents.'

'I don't want you to get hurt.'

'And I don't intend to flee or waste my time. Look, Morg, any minute Gos is in there counts. Please, just get that dust. I need to go.' He touched her hand briefly. She got the back out of the cupboard.

'We are ill-informed. We might regret this later on. Dark, we have no idea how this world - '

'I guess that's what being brave often comes down to,' Dark said, lying down. He neglected her warnings, had so little fear to do what had to be done. It was she admired in him and at the same time a dangerous streak. His recklessness and self-centeredness were always outweighed by his selflessness and insecurity, this streak of heroic sacrificing. He knew what counted. It made him a hero. It also made him pretty stupid.

'Sweet dreams, Morg.'

'Catch you on the flipside, Dark.'

After Morgana had instructed Archie to wake Darkwing in case of emergency or when he'd get a magical signal of her. She doubted that she could send it all the way through Dream World, though. Uneasy, she walked out of her library and spells room. She needed a token that she could bring and that would remind her of who she was and that she could go back to when Nodoff tried to trick her. She contemplated bringing the chariot card, but it seemed a bit big to carry around and her dress had no pockets. She sought all over the house and the only thing she found was a little ring that had once belonged to her mother. It would have to do. It wasn't a ball of yarn, that's for sure, but it was real and movable enough. You could play with it when it was on your finger, real and cold, tangible. There was a small chance Eek and Squeek had found more information at her father's house. They would find her anywhere she went. To be sure, she put on her perfume that they smelled from long distance and used a charm to lure them. She had to make do with the little things.

Standing in front of the door, she almost wanted to knock it. Morgana had forgotten so many advanced spells during the years that seemed unnecessary or inconvenient that she wondered if she'd still be able to reproduce the basics of magic now. A copy of her spell book would've been nice about now. Thirty-four years of magic, of which twenty had been more or less educated, and she felt like she was five years old again, scorching her dad with an accidental flame spell she had no control over. The feeling of anxiety and unease that had started all this and that had forced her into Dream World, this need of abandoning the world, was there again. Still, shaking hands with your imagination wasn't always that pretty.


	6. Chapter 6

**A.N.** This chapter elaborates upon magic in the DWD universe which was a joy to imagine and integrate in the story. There's a bit from Dark's point of view that was wonderful to write as well, hope it shows. Again, thanks for the support!

**VI**

Back in class miss what-was-her-name-again-gods-she-was-getting-old, the enchantments teacher, had always said that to use magic properly, your sense of self had to fade and that you had to help it do that, purposely. The state before using magic, the preparation phase, was a kind of self-induced meditation, a forceful drug that had to numb you. That demanded a lot of concentration and physically, it was rather draining as well.

At the same time, though, your self and especially your subconscious had to be emphasized. You had to stay around, couldn't loose yourself to those forces entirely. 'Stay in control' was miss what-was-her-name-again's primary catchphrase. Magic works in a paradox, a little mobius strip you couldn't escape from. She had said something like: 'When you do magic, it will tear you apart. You will go through a world of hurt and sometimes, you want to let it all out, all of that magic, but you can't. Sometimes, because of this, you hurt those around you, and that's when you're still holding back. That's what magic does: it messes with your brain.'

Miss-what-was-her-name had this annoying habit of walking through the room, sometimes doing surprise spells on some of the students. A gush of wind played in one of the girl's hair, the letters in the books were turned upside down or their shadows would be swapped. It was hilarious, but sometimes, a bit scary as well. She wanted to make the point that magic was wonderful and eerie at the same time. She did it well. 'As students, you will endure a lot of stress,' the teacher had warned them. 'Most of you will drop out because of this. You will not be the same after this education. In part, you will learn to meditate, learn to stay relaxed. While perfecting your skills is one part of magic, the other part is controlling your self. This is the hardest part, the emotional part. You will need to stay calm, especially in times of anger, so that you can direct the energy that flows through you properly. One mistake and bam, you can be gone. That's why magic that's fused by anger is the most destructive, the most violent force there is. Though emotions fuel magic and are its source of inspiration - creativity and imagination rely on emotions, after all - if you can't learn to guide your feelings, the magic will affect you.'

Some of her fellow-students had gone crazy indeed. In fact, now that Morgana was sucked into Dream World they were standing around her. She had migrated through the clouds into something that was clearly her subconscious and it was hard not to go along with those lines of thoughts, those gut feelings that were being voiced by a bunch of animals she hadn't seen in years.

'You are very emotional,' one of them said, a girl who had dropped out of class in the first year already. 'You can't do this. You've faked it so much but how long can you really keep it up, Morgana? You're dead inside.'

'Let that kid bleed to bits,' a guy said that she hardly recognized. 'Let her be. You can't win this. We all have happy normal lives now.'

'You should get one too,' a fox girl spoke. 'You can't do that with him. He never respects you. Not the magic, not you. Your borderline behaviour and your magicalness. Not that there's a difference between the two, really.'

'Or maybe you need to get more magical,' the guy said. 'You're constantly hammering on our door because you need imagination, a sense of wonderment and enchantment and openness he'll never understand. Just leave us be. We'll get the girl, you go.'

'We'll save her, promise,' the fox girl winked. Her black clothes were pretty funky and reminded Morgana again that she was dreaming this up. It was nauseating and recognizable, this conversation.

'I won't,' Morgana said. 'I'm very sorry for all of you.' The persona in the dream reminded her of the tiny voices and figments that she had just before going to bed. They were not her class mates and they could not be trusted. She closed her eyes and outthought them, wept her mind clean by focusing on her classes of imaginative magic. That's when she was in the class room again with her old imaginative teacher. He held her hand. It was kind of inappropriate, but then again, she had had a crush on him when she was 16 and apparently her subconscious hadn't forgotten.

'You need to feel the magic and bend it. People will try to get to your mind. It won't do. You need to make a safety door, a kind of loophole you can always think of.'

'My loophole isn't you.'

'Apparently it's some strong magic working against you then since you are reminded of me and not of the loophole we thought of back in the days. Tell me what your loophole was.'

Morgana touched the ring.

'Ah, you brought a token, smart. It's almost just as effective.'

'It works every time,' Morgana said. 'You taught me well.'

'I do hope so. This is what it all boils down to. Or maybe not, maybe there'll be more confrontations. Tell me what you thought of, how do you think yourself out of this mess?'

'One of the first rules you told me, was never to tell anyone. Not even you.' She smiled. 'And to use diversions, other images.'

'Interesting.'

'Isn't it, Nodoff?'

His head made a crunchy sound while it tossed sideways, eyes spastic, beak changing. The feathers shook off until there was nothing but a green, snake-like skin.

'Yes, Morgana. You are kind of hard to get to.' Nodoff's voice cracked through her old teacher's body. He was still wearing his suit, had his smell.

'And here I was, thinking you'd be playing with Gosalyn.'

'She's trapped, and your dearest Dark is stuck in a nightmare too.'

'And now you are trying to get to me by play pretending you're my old school teacher. Wonderful. Still, he was a lot brighter than you are. One of the basics of imaginative magic –'

'Oh, shut it.'

She fell through a hole he had created under her feet, like he had simply clawed the earth away. It ended up in big tunnel filled with nothing. She saw his green face disappearing, grinning above the grey suit of her old teacher. Meanwhile, she thought of her loophole, a memory of her mother's favourite meal, a magical purple mushroom soup. It was the pettiest loophole ever, but because it was so ordinary, she hoped no one could ever guess it. The taste, the texture, the five mushrooms, the white cream that she always poured in it. It was tangible and appealed to a few of her senses and that was important for a good loophole. When something was off, you'd notice it. You wouldn't immediately be able to transfer all of the details of such a soup - its taste, its bite, its smell, its ingredients - to an intruder of your imagination. At least, that's what she hoped right now.

0

'We've missed you so much, Dark,' Morgana whispered. Something was a bit off, he felt, but he couldn't put his finger on it. Was Morgana playing tricks on him again? Had she been developing a new scheme behind his back?

'Me, Archie, Eek, Squeek,' her hand went up his neck to his beak. He felt hot under his collar. Before he'd met her, he'd hardly had any decent relationships. His busy schedule the last, say, ten years had kind of made dating impossible until he'd given up on it altogether. His job always came first. Lately though, now that he had Gosalyn and Launchpad around, he'd learned that there were other things in life he could care about. Other people actively went looking for them, with him it was the other way around though. They had been force-fed into his life, but he had grown fond of them anyway. And not much later, he'd bumped into Morgana during his job as well. Sometimes, when he was younger, he thought he'd given up a lot of things to be a hero but now they came to him anyway. Almost like there had be some kind of catch.

'Morg, are you okay?'

'I'm just happy to see you again, cupcake.'

'I was on a mission.'

'What kind of mission?' She snuggled closer and blinked. He loved those eye lashes.

'I can't remember.'

'Were you working too hard again? Oh sweetie, why can't you stay with me some more? Launchpad will babysit Gos and we'll have my house to ourselves.'

'Morgana, you know I can't do that.' He lifted up her head. 'Help me find out what I'm supposed to do.'

'I'm not sure. Were you in a fight? Did Bushroot spray you with some chemical compound again? I can check my books if you want, recover your memory.'

'I guess.' Still, what he preferred was staying here with her, sitting on the couch, looking at that streak of moonlight that peeked through the window. Her body, so cold at first, gradually warmed up next to him. He kissed her hand. It was like her presence sharpened all of his senses and at the same time, numbed some.

'We'll figure it out,' he mumbled. 'Just give me some time.'

'Always.'

'Morgana, you know that you're…'

'Hm?'

'The nicest thing that has happened to me. It's… I mean… Of course, there's my daughter, but darling, I've been waiting for something like this for such a long time. And I never knew it, I guess, until I had it.'

'You are so sweet, Dark.'

And that's when he noticed, when he looked deep into her eyes, that something was wrong. The thought of Gosalyn made it click somehow and it all fitted together. The things he cared about and the things he wished started to mend. Yes_, his daughter_. That was it. He knew he had to leave her or that she had to leave him. The house started to fall into bits around them. The walls turned into sand.

'I was supposed to find you here, Morg, but you're not her.'

'I guess not,' she whispered while her hands leaned on his shoulders and started to deteriorate.

He felt sick when he dusted away little pieces of her, removed them from his sleeves, his shoulders. Out of the sand, a desert was formed. He wasn't sure where he was supposed to go. Dream World, that was where he was and there would be much more illusions and eventually, Nodoff himself. He needed to find Morgana but before his feet, the desert stretched even further. The walk was long and dry. It reminded him of that hour glass she'd been stuck in once. The sand was creeping in on her. Her hands, tapping the glass, made him feel even more desperate when he couldn't reach her. It resonated with the beating of his heart. Come to think of it, that was only a small prank Nodoff had played, child's play really. It kind of made you wonder what actual mischief he could pull off and what evil spells he had up his sleeve for any special occasions.

The walk was long. Sand, what was with all of that sand, all of the time?

0

Morgana was wandering through a familiar landscape. The fog made it a bit unclear, but it seemed to be the meadow near the house she grew up in as a child. The fields, the forest, a distant river, those were very recognizable spots, land mark in her memory. She would still evoke them when reading a novel and in her dreams, whenever she was reminded of nature, this was her archetype. When meditating, she'd even revisit meadow again. All of these spots combined formed a perfect and fertile ground to perform magic. Many of the elements were nearby and could be channeled. Of course, Morgana used less elemental magic than her mother. As a young child, Morgana had shown a talent for transforming objects and guiding the weather, as well as a latent quality that enabled her to bend the imagination of others and herself.

At school, she had been placed with the creative children who used their minds to get magic channeled. These included kids who used imaginative magic, transformation, divination, illusionism, healing. Opposed to that were the psychical mages who used their bodies to, for instance, channel elements, forces of the earth or to shape shift into other creatures. Some of them could even swap bodies with other sorcerers of their kind. Their classes overlapped, but when the mentalists were meditating and learning to use their concentration at fullest for spells, the physical kids were strengthening their bodies. They had to stay in tip top shape and grow extra strong to guide the spells or morph into different beings. Each day, they passed by several times, running laps over the large meadow just outside the school. Foxes, ducks, dogs and cats that were bending their bodies in strange ways and in their free time, could use these freely amongst each other, like one collective. Sadly, some of them turned into hybrids by doing these spells wrong and merging their bodies.

There were rumours throughout the school that each year a few of them, who had officially dropped out, had actually passed away in some unfortunate magical incident. Think of a swapping spell had gone wrong. Though they could be put in the right body again afterwards, it never felt the same. 'That's what embodied magic does to you,' a fourth-year student had told Morgana once. 'You manipulate your body so much it doesn't feel like home anymore. You break. Maybe you even kill yourself. Sure, some of us mentalists go pretty nuts by bending our minds that much, by putting mental stress on ourselves, but the physical ones aren't better off. They get worn out so easily. It doesn't take much to feel out of place in your body. We're all teens. Add a little more alienation and insecurity to that and you can imagine what they're going through. It hurts like hell. They get trained, of course, but I'm not sure if it helps. There's only so much you can endure, right? That's why some of them leave, but hey, it's no different with us, right? Gotta keep your cool.'

Right now, Morgana did her best to keep her cool. Thinking of the risks of magic brought you no good, she knew this as no other, but not bearing them in mind would stimulate reckless behaviour. It was hard to find a balance between these things. That was also why she was getting more insecure. Before she had met Darkwing, there wasn't anyone she could hurt beside herself, and she'd taking care of herself wonderfully for many, many years, thank you very much. Now, she had the pressure of him, his kid, Launchpad. Directly or indirectly, they could be affected too. What she had learned at school from the other students and the teachers was a valuable asset today. Still, she knew she needed to rid herself of the insecurity she felt as well. When spell-casting, that could be even more dangerous than being passionate or sloppy.

Yes, these lessons had been wise, Morgana had to admit. More than what her father had taught her, at least, who had often been forceful when she had been young. He had wanted her to channel magic so badly and so early that her mother often had to prevent him from locking little Morgana in the basement until she gave off a phosphor glow or from putting her through six long trials in the forest. 'But she's only 8,' mom would say, trying to appeal to his sanity. It worked, more or less, now she only had to study harder and meditate in the forest with her mother. This was also why the forest was so important. It was one of the places where she could still meet up with her, sense her. The dream did not even offer Morgana a glimpse of her though. She guessed that was a relief, maybe.


	7. Chapter 7

VII

In Dream World, the forest could hardly be divided from the meadow itself. The fog was increasing. Morgana heard a distant ticking. 'I need to find Gosalyn, feel her, I need to imagine and transport myself to her.' She used the same magic spell she had performed in a test long ago. It fabricated a kind of imaginary compass or symbol that could guide you, depending on how the spell related to the environment.

At first, Morgana presumed it hadn't worked because when she opened her eyes, nothing was there. When she continued to walk though, she came to a fork in the road in what appeared to be the forest already. It was awfully quiet: no birds, no bugs, no wind. In the centre of the fork, an hour glass was standing. She knew that she hadn't fabricated this herself. Nodoff - or someone else maybe? – had to be behind this. The sand in the top glass was only filled half, meaning that she was running out of time. She wondered what it referred to. The moment that Gosalyn would be sucked into Dream World forever? Or the moment until Morgana herself would be so exhausted and would remain trapped in her subconcious?

Stuck to the hour glass was a wayward sign telling her to go right. Morgana believed it and also detached the sign from the hour glass with a little magic. Maybe it was one of those imaginary sign posts that changed its words the further you went down the road; she sure hoped so. Behind it, on the golden skeleton of the hour glass where she'd removed the sign, she saw the name of her mother. It was carved in the gold like it was nothing but a signature. Her subconscious was probably speaking to her, Morgana believed, but for a moment she found it hard to breathe and wondered if maybe mom was still watching over her approvingly. 'God, I'm getting old, sentimental. No need.'

She took the sign. The right road meandered through the forest a long time but never changed its direction. Eventually, in front of a crossroad, Morgana used more imaginative magic on it. It flew from her fingers in little sparks and in response, the sign started to morph. The by-product was that it not only changed its word but also spoke it and told a bit more. It was nice to have a companion though. Kind of freaky it sounded a bit like Launchpad though.

They had a long way to go. After a while, the remarks about Hungry Hippo and flight machines became a bit tedious. She should have known immediately that it wouldn't take her to see Gos but LP instead. His plane was stranded in the forest. He was repairing it and only noticed her when she coughed. That's when the sign vapourized in her hands. She looked up and right before her eyes the forest tree had changed and suddenly looked like apartment buildings. In that bizarre version of Saint Canards, with grey trees that had windows in them and a dried out river in the far distance, Morgana approached Launchpad, hoping she could hitch a ride. There was something odd about him she couldn't place. It felt natural, like dreams do so often when you are actually standing in the wrong setting or talking to a person that looks nothing like the one you have in mind. She couldn't put her finger on it; all she knew was that this wasn't Nodoff and that she was perhaps venturing further into her subconscious than she should. The ring grew tighter around her finger.

0

_One day, we'll get married_. Dark was pretty sure of that, he always had been. He never spoke about his hopes and dreams for her but here, in the desert, he was constantly reminded of her presence. She wasn't there, but he felt he was looking for her.

'No, for Gos,' he constantly had to remind himself. 'For Nodoff. I got to stay cool, got to find him.' After miles of sand, he came across a bit of water and a palm tree. The typical scenery you see in a tourist brochure or maybe an old-fashioned cartoon where you run out of water when you need it the most. He thought it would be a trick, that he would bow down and grasp sand. Instead, the water made a kind of whirlpool and showed familiar shapes. In the oasis he saw her reflection instead of his. She was wearing a ring, playing with it. Marriage, he thought, is she having one of those dreams again?

He remembered the last time he'd been stuck in Dream World with her, how the most pleasant thing she could think of was having a family life with him. It kind of freaked him out. He was a loner, always had been. He was unsure if he could take care off her and Gos, he was unsure if she was right for him. She had still been a villain back then - a charming one, but a villain nonetheless. Now that he had gotten to know her and she had sworn of her evil ways, he could imagine that dream as well. Sometimes, he woke up and it seemed that he had shared it. He vaguely remembered her white dress and the flowers she carried. Gosalyn, their bridesmaid, along with Morgana's pets, were happy for them and hugged them. It left a sweet taste. Yes, nowadays he always assumed they would be together at some point. It would be hard, there was no denying that, and he would have to learn to be even less self-centered, but she always brought out those qualities he never knew he had. Just like Gosalyn did.

Morgana played with the ring and talked to someone. Launchpad, maybe? But how could he reach her? He leapt in, toes first, and then went in altogether. It was a little bit like flying.

0

Nodoff will find me, Morgana thought. He's part of my subconscious but he's invading it, creeping in.

'Launchpad, can you bring me to Gosalyn, do you know where she is?' Launchpad felt off. Did he work for Nodoff? For her? Was he a figment of Dark's imagination?

'I know where she is,' he nodded. 'I can bring you, but we need to stop at the Hungry Hippo first. Also, my plane is broken.'

'Don't worry about that,' she said. She repaired it quickly, one magic touch and it transformed. That was her expertise and she felt good sharing it. Launchpad did not seem amused though. He shook his head.

'You know I hate you, Morgana, right? That magic thing you do? I don't trust you.'

'What?'

'I dislike you monsters, the whole lot of you. There's no good in any of you. It's no wonder DW always cuts you off when anything happens.'

'I'm sorry? Are you playing tricks on me again?'

'I'm his room mate, his best friend, I know what's best for him and Gosalyn. And that sure as hell isn't you. We were doing fine but you always bring in this unnecessary emotional, magical baggage. You always want to be this kind of super girl, helping out, this kind of Justice Duck. Well, guess what, you can't even do a spell right anymore.' He was looking less and less like Launchpad and more and more green-gray, like any minute he'd shed off his feathers to reveal a green-gray ghoul skin.

'You are me. You are my insecurity again, talking.'

'You know that I hate you. This is the real me talking, what I've always felt. Come on, you knew all along. When did I ever make you feel welcome? Get you coffee when you came over? Never, right? I avoid you as much as I can. I don't want to bound with you, even if you want it badly, even if you talk to me, ask me how my night with DW was. You fake interest but I'll tell you what: You'll never part of our family.'

'Stop it. Stop talking to me.' Outthink him_, outthink him._ All she could think of was a simple wish. She wished he'd disappear, that he'd change his attitude, that he'd morph. He remained static. First rule of magic, stay calm, like teach always taught you. _Stay calm, Morgana_.

'I work for Nodoff, you think? Maybe. Maybe I'm just clingy.' Launchpad took his toolbox into the plane.

She envisioned him getting sucked into the ground. Didn't work. She whispered a few spells of imaginative magic to repel unwanted figments. They seemed to do the trick. Launchpad seemed to be feeling nauseous and reached out to his stomach. It turned into a black hole.

'I think I'll leave. I know where Gosalyn is, but I don't think I want to tell you.' The engine started. Morgana zapped the plane again. 'You are not leaving.'

'Watch me.' The black hole was expanding.

'Give me information, tell me where she is.'

'Never.' Launchpad, the thing that vaguely resembled him, turned blacker and more like the shadow of the plane.

'Morgana?' Darkwing's voice sounded nearby. Morgana turned around. He was standing in front of her, all of the sudden, looking at the plane. 'Funny, for a minute I thought I'd heard Launchpad.'

'Just the dreams talking,' she looked out him thoroughly.

What was left of Launchpad and hadn't been consumed by magic yet was still able to communicate. 'Let her go, DW. It isn't Morgana. Come with me, I'll take you to Gosalyn and far away from this place.' With every word he gained more colour. Darkwing's belief in him must be feeding him. It sickened Morgana. She was ready to cast another spell.

'Don't trust him,' she said softly. 'He's tricking you and me both.'

'Does he work for Nodoff?'

'I'm not sure, but he's at least a hostile element of our imagination.'

'I told you, DW, getting a girlfriend is not a good idea. They always talk into you. I'm a good figment, the trustworthy one, your best friend. I can get you to Gosalyn just like that.' Geez, he was convincing for a shadow, wasn't he? 'You ran into her more than once here, right? How can you be sure it really is her?'

'How can I be sure you can be trusted, LP?'

'I can tell you that Nodoff locked Gosalyn in a comic she loves, that she is playing a young heroine nonstop. She's saving the world, just like her dad. She's so happy. We'll take her back, of course, but I wish you could see her now, she's so-'

'Oh, give us a break! You trapped the kid!' Morgana cried out. 'I can see right through you.'

'Morgana, stop, don't work your magic on him!' He spread his arm to stop her. 'Okay, where is she?'

'Come with me.'

'He's tricking us, don't you see?'

'But Morg, what if this is our only chance to find her?'

'She's not Morgana,' he said. 'She wants to prevent you from finding Gos. It's Nodoff talking, don't you see?'

She zapped him before Darkwing could reply, whispering in a short spell that all her negative projections had to leave, that she wanted to form their surroundings, their dream.

'Come find me when you are done,' the shadow of Launchpad still managed to whisper. That's when he disappeared altogether and their surroundings changed into a rather empty black scenery. There were some windows lit in the distance. Morgana could see the outline of his hideout, at least, she presumed as much when she noticed towers. They were silent for some time, walked through the blackness, two lost, blind lovers looking for a night light.

'Morg, is it really you?' He touched her cheek lovingly.

'Yes, yes, ask me a question, anything.'

'I need to make sure we can outwit my subconscious and yours, they're constantly cheating on us. A meta-question, maybe. Why are we here?'

'To find Gosalyn, stop Nodoff and seal the door to Dream World, maybe even permanently.'

'Yes, exactly, fair enough, but Launchpad also knew that. If he is a figment as you think, he's pretty damn clever. Tell me something new, something only you know.'

'Your worst nightmare is not being a hero anymore; it's been your obsession, your job for such a long time. It defines you. It defines you so much you depend on it and come across as arrogant, but not to me, I get what you're doing. I've seen it at the magical academy so often. You remind me of me in that sense, you know. You hate cooperation, because your job matters so much to you and you want to do it so perfect. You can't tolerate a single flaw and you feel you need to pull through all on your own, build strength, strategies, use your little gadgets just in time. It's never enough. In the end, you know it's necessary to involve others.'

'That's rich,' he said but she saw he knew it was more or less true, maybe a bit harsh, but true.

'Guess you like getting credit for what you do. It gives you this sense that you are on the right path, that you're really doing good instead of, God forbid, wasting your life.'

'Morg, you sound more like a shrink than a lover.'

'You told me enough and I know your heart well-enough, Dark. Need more? You love reading prose and inspiring your catchphrases on it. We flipped through a few of my novels a week ago.'

'Yes, we did. Makes my drama seem a bit kitsch, huh?'

She touched his hand briefly. 'Not to me. And you know I'm me, because you love me, you know I'm not you talking or Nodoff. Dark, you love me as much as you fear me. That's why you don't want me to be a villain ever again. You told me once, a few months back, that you thought I had real powers and could outdo you and that sometimes, you had problems dealing with that. But that you loved me so much that you - '

'Ssssh,' he said. 'I believe you. Plus, my subconscious would probably never invent you with a ring, your subconscious on the other hand – anyway, why is that?'

'It's mom's, a token, in case I start to forget I'm dreaming.'

'Very convincing,' he nodded. 'It's you, I know you are. Okay, ask me something.'

'Hm, difficult. I shouldn't ask you about me because you would know everything about me, if you were me. If you know what I mean. So something clever, hm, who'll wake you up when something goes wrong?'

'Archie. And we are waiting for information on Nodoff and dream ghouls. It's almost like an episode of _Duckie: The Vampire Hunter._'

'Sounds solid to me, Dark, dearest. I guess you could still be part of my dream scape but I'll buy into this for now.' She kissed him. 'I'll know when you're lying anyway.'

'That weird version of Launchpad left,' Dark sulked. 'What do we do now?'

'Did you notice your hideout in the distance?'

'Of course I did, Morgana!'

'I'm sure he's there and if not, that we can find clues about where Gosalyn is. In our subconscious, certain things function in the same way as in real life – maps, signs, your gadgets, the plane. They are signals. Even if they malfunction, I can manipulate them.'

'And then we'll stop that no-good Nodoff's naughty ways and defeat his deliberate dream doings for good!'

'The walk is a bit long though. Allow me to imagine us a means of transport.' She succeeded rapidly, had gotten the hang of this imaginative magic. It was no different than transforming things in real life except that you really had to believe it, mean it even more. In that sense, the costs were higher.

Out of the black shadows a black gondola emerged. It rode them to the tower. They didn't even need to do anything. It had no paddles or engine, it just meandered there. They passed some figments of Morgana's imagination but not too many. They all stood on the shores, waiting for them. When she mentioned this to Darkwing, it turned out he saw his own family and acquaintances. Morgana had expected their dreams to merge but apparently some parts of Dream World would still be subjective. In a way, this scared her. What other schisms and inconsistencies would appear in this world? And what was covered up by that black void they crossed? Swirls of fog surrounded the vessel as if they were venturing into the white clouds again.

Her hand reached out to the absent water that they floated on. Its blackness stuck to her fingers like ink only to vanish moments later. The line between the conceptual and the magical, the subjective and the objective, suddenly seemed so thing. It seemed to her that they were drifting through language rather than through actual memories, that they had unraveled a knot of experiences or maybe even expression. Just words, really, that needed to be voiced in order to be re-imagined.

At the end of the ride, they reached a whirlpool instead of the shores. Her first thought was loosing him. His last was that he had lost her. There was only a moon, far above them, and slender white fingers slipping through his.


	8. Chapter 8

**VIII**

Her walk was long. The black void did not end. The inside of the whirlpool resembled the belly of a whale. It smelt like salt. The floor on which she walked was moist and soft like tissue at the same time. There were no shapes and hardly any sounds but there need not be any. She understood that it was just like the archetypical story of the boy being swallowed by a whale. What those stories never depicted was that it was hard to live in that kind of darkness, that it suffocated you. She had to imagine herself out of this mess but it took her a while to figure out how.

Things got kind of blurry there. She felt like she belonged in this void. Before she succumbed to it, she remembered that her old teacher of imaginative magic had always told his students to be careful, that this type of magic took up much of your mental space until, in the end, you started to doubt what was real. That was when the magic would malfunction. You'd start to believe things were meant to be this way and finally, your subconscious would collapse on you. It messed with you even more than ordinary magic did. That's why they took breaks as students and meditated, to prevent the world from crumbling down. Morgana took the liberty of having a few of those quiet moments, even though time was pressing. When she opened her eyes, her head had cleared a bit. Had she even met Darkwing just a moment ago? She could not be sure. Though she could think straight now, she doubted the things she had seen and all her current surroundings. All she could do was move forward and manipulate her environment, have the trust that she could overcome her own dreams and hopes.

With her regained concentration, she conjured a compass that shot straight from her heart as a golden arrow and circle. It did not point her to the right direction: it created it, until she was surrounded by all the right things, fully aware that they were wrong. She followed the golden thread it had created, a yellow brick road that unfolded out of the whale's belly like a tongue.

Whispers in the dark and flashes of the past greeted her. When you would give into that magic, they had told her, all those hopes and dreams you could project, you would have a bit of a problem returning to reality. If you would give in, there was not just the risk of loosing it completely. There was the chance of consciously returning to everyday life and finding it empty of imagination, horribly cold, dry and uninspiring. All clouds without a silver lining, a world shrouded in fog. Enough to make even the happiest person utterly depressed.

Empty.

0

He was sucked into his own dream, one that he'd had before, one in which he had died. It was a dream he had had a few months ago and he was not happy to see it again. He had died before in his dreams like most people. He had fallen to his death at the end of them, had been tormented by Quakerjack, Negaduck and even killed off by Morgana once. This particular dream had stuck with him though since it had been vivd and he had died in the beginning, instead of at the end where he usually woke up. In an unfortunate crash with his bike, he became all spirit, just transparent matter floating in a dream reality. Everyone noticed he was a ghost in this particular dream. It was like standing in a class room naked, really, or in his case, fighting crime naked and being mocked by the Fearsome Four. It was kind of weird, being stuck in that very same dream again.

Now he was almost invisible, foggy, but because he had had the dream before, he felt like he could fight it. He saw Launchpad sitting near his grave and knew for sure then that there was no escaping this. His grave was pretty pathetic, nothing like the grave he would expect as the town's most renowned caped crusader. It did not glorify his perplexing, purple persona at all. He already saw it once before, so this time, he did not care that much. He had a job to do and time was running out.

He approached Launchpad, put his hand on his shoulder, ignoring his own grave. He knew that only by believing he had not died, by accepting the dream and convincing himself of its reality, he could communicate with his best friend.

'Tell me where Gosalynn is.' This time, Launchpad did not hear him and seemed to be acting quite normal, sobbing in a tissue, petting that pathetic grave. He was clearly not the shadow version he had come across earlier but not really LP either. He tried to touch LP's shoulder.

'I'm still alive, you know.' No response. He was in his own dream and at the same time, a distant outsider in it. His dream reality did not accept him. He was not sure what to make of that. In the end, he left Launchpad there, mourning. Last time, he had at least been willing to help his old pal DW out.

Darkwing walked from the graveyard to Morgana's house. He found it quite creepy his corpse was buried in her backyard in his dream. He had to remind himself that when his trip to Dream World would finally be over, he would make a will and write in it he would prefer not to be buried there. The door knob greeted him before he used it to knock.

'Yeah, yeah, just enter already.' When he pushed the door, it already appeared to be open.

That's when the setting just changed in an instant. Her house was not her house at all but the Hungry Hippo. Eek and Squeek were working at the counter along with another employee, an adolescent of whom he only saw the back. 'Eek, Squeek! Are you dream versions or your actual selves?' They did not respond. Eek held the pan and threw the burger in it far in the air, where Squeek caught it with a small plate he carried on his back. Those little bats could perform quite some interesting stunts.

'Did you find a way to defeat Nodoff yet?' The pets seemed oblivious.

'Did someone call me?' The adolescent turned around. He had Nodoff's face and grinned at Darkwing.

'Nice to see you again, Darkwing. And it really doesn't help to shout out where you are in Dream World, I can find you so easily then.'

'I am the terror that flaps – ' He spread his cape.

'Cut the drama, I know what you're going to say, after all, I'm your own imagination that you're fighting.'

'What did you do to Gosalyn, Nodoff?'

'You'll find out soon enough.'

'Release her, you surreal, sorrowful sight of my self.'

'What will you do about it without your girlfriend here? Have you found a way to deal with me yet?'

'Well, I guess I - ,' he stumbled, 'that I will outthink you.'

'No, I will shape your imagination first. You see, that was not your worst nightmare, wasn't it?'

'Happy thoughts,' Darkwing said, 'happy thoughts.' He closed his eyes. 'I can do this, just like Morgana, just like her. It is not related to magic, it's my imagination. These are my dreams.'

He had returned to Morgana's mansion when he opened his eyes. Eek and Squeek were flying about, still wearing Hungry Hippo hats. She stood in the window, with his her back facing towards him. He stretched out his transparent hand. She was crying.

Behind him, Nodoff coughed. He was sitting in one of her antique chairs. This was the room where he had first met her, the meeting room where she discussed matters with her evil employees, henchmen, supposed family members, enchanted mushrooms, whatever you preferred calling them. He remembered her pretty face in the moonlight quite vividly.

'Want me to tell you about your little woman?' Nodoff asked. 'She has so many hidden passions, this one. Starting a new company, joining your family, gaining your respect.'

'There is no one I respect more,' Darkwing responded.

'You think so? See, she does not see that. She thinks you are suspicious of her and as the representation of your subconsciousness, let me tell you, you are. You are constantly afraid she will perform better than you and as someone who has actual powers, she will. You will have to face this. She is way out of your league. You do not respect her. You downplay her.'

'Stop it, you, you - '

'You are better of without her.' Moonlight illuminated Morgana's body in the window. It collapsed like a doll. Her clothes fell on the floor, empty.

'You don't want her in your life. You make little effort. It shows.'

'That's nonsense.'

'You know it's not,' Nodoff said. 'Your little dysfunctional family will do just peachy without her.'

'I can't, I wouldn't…'

'You know what your worst nightmare is, isn't it? Do you want me to repeat it?'

'No, you are messing with my head, just so I won't find Gosalyn. I need to focus.'

'You are not strong enough mentally, I can feel a little push, but it just doesn't do. So, dear, mighty Darkwing Duck, if you'll do me the honours.' He took a bow and made a pass for the window that morphed into a door.

'Follow me,' the ghoul commanded.

'Not a chance.'

'Fine.'

Morgana's bright golden chandelier fell on his head.

0

The room was empty aside from the noises. A sound like drums beat in her ears, painstakingly creating a melody or the illusion of a melody. For a second, she could have sworn it was her heartbeat instead of the rhythm produced by a machine. She had found Gosalyn or so she hoped.

'Videogame beats,' Morgana muttered. 'This has to be Gosalyn's dream.'

It was not a bad dream, in fact, it felt okay walking through it, unlike before. Maybe Nodoff had caught her in a positive dream because they stuck more. It was more fun to stay in them and that was what he wanted all along, a nice prisoner, a way to get even. The real world and Saint Canards had proved themselves to be boring and void for Nodoff but he could still take prisoners here. Irony was that real life could hardly offer Gosalyn anything better than this kind of warmth and comfort.

'Gosalyn, dear, are you here?'

Maybe she was wrong, maybe this was another dream, one of her own. Morgana moved forward and finally bumped into an obstacle she could not even see in the darkness. She stepped on it and found it to be a black staircase. It winded upwards. She followed it and found a small white door. She blew it up with her magic. It made her feel feint, she had probably wasted too much magic already. Her attention was all over the place. When she looked around, it seemed like there were cracks in the darkness around her, little bits of memory seeping through. They formed portals to other worlds. In one of them, she saw Gosalyn. She forgot about the door and succumbed to the image she saw.

A new dream formed. Gosalyn pulled her arm.

'Let's play that videogame together.' They sat in a dark room together that vaguely resembled Drake's living room, if it had been in his hideout and if he had had an interest for cauldrons and magic books.

'Yes, of course.' She picked up the controller and defeated Gosalyn in a short fighting game.

'You cheated again,' Gosalyn muttered when she saw that Morgana had raised her hand from the controller. 'I hate it when you make your avatar do new things!'

'I'm just testing the limits of the games.'

'It's not fair.'

'Aw, come on, Gos, let's do one more. You'll defeat me anyway. Let me be good in this for once too.'

Gosalyn put out her tongue and in a rapid combo, threw Morgana's character off screen.

'That's what I'm talking about.'

'I wish dad would play with me more often.'

'He's at work right now,' Morgana sighed.

'I know. He's fighting Nodoff.'

'Is it you, Gosalyn?'

'What do you mean?'

'Do you want to leave Dream World with me?'

'I don't think so.'

'Do you remember Nodoff capturing you?'

'No.'

'I think I'm at the wrong place but it feels right.'

'Do you want to play another game or get some pizza?' Gosalyn asked. 'Or read comics? I never had a mom that really did things with me. You're different from dad, more like granddad, doing things with me, little things. I like that.'

'I don't want to leave you.' She hugged Gosalyn. 'But I have to. You're not the one I'm looking for. You're me talking, my Self, and you are all the things that I want.'

'I can take you to another dream, so you wouldn't be tired. Stay here.'

'No.'

'You'll die,' Gosalyn said bluntly, bashing the controller in her hand. The avatar suddenly looked a lot like Morgana or was that just a projection as well? 'There's too less magic in you. You have been here too long. Yes, level 5. Take that!'

'I don't think so,' Morgana said. 'You might be right, I fear that I'll grow weak, but I'll make it. I'll get you out of here. I must.'

'When you leave, Nodoff still finds you, you know. He's always here, out to get you.'

'Possibly.'

She stood up and looked around. In the corner, there was a book shelf that surely contained some information that was supposed to get her out of here. Some images, she had learned throughout the years, can be put in our imagination for a certain purpose. She had visualized such information long ago as a kind of house that you remembered. Every room contained certain spells and the items that stood in there – vases, a particular book, certain ingredients – could help you visualize what you had to do. They were memory tricks, really. Especially for imaginative magic, which leaned on memory and creativity, it was necessary to build a house for your best spells that could also help shield your imagination. If you wanted to know when you were dreaming, such a house could come in very handy. Like loopholes and little physical rings, recognizing typical items from your subconscious helped you understand you were really locked in your imagination. She had known that book shelf since college. Any shred of doubt Morgana had still left vanished in an instant. She had herself a litmus test and Gosalyn had failed it.

Morgana opened one of her magic books in the room and kindly asked the imaginary figments to leave. She did not look at Gosalyn's screaming face or the hurt she felt when she clutched onto the hem of Morgana's dress. _She's not real. She's not real_. Before the book closed, Morgana's dream had vaporized. Real is such an ugly word.


	9. Chapter 9

A.N. I loved writing this one. There's a Duck Knight ref in here somewhere. Good luck finding it. XD

**IX**

He woke up, trapped behind bars. Some aspects of the dungeon reminded him of Morgana's mansion. Behind him, Archie appeared - a dream version of the spider, undoubtedly. Nodoff appeared to be his warden, walking from left to right in front of the jail, wearing a silly hat. Darkwing grinned a bit. This dream was so literal he could hardly take it seriously.

'Ah, you're awake.'

'I guess.'

'It's kind of difficult, fighting me, ey?'

'I have some good ideas about how to get rid off you.'

'Sure you do. Where was I again? Ah yes, Morgana. You want to know about her? I wonder where she is right now. She visits me a lot, you know. She's a regular of this place.'

'What do you mean?' He felt drowsy.

'I'm saying; she comes to Dream World a lot. She can't deal with reality that well, is loosing her grips a bit.'

'Stop it. She's doing peachy. She's got me. What would she want here?'

'Spy on you, for starters. She infiltrates your dreams all the time, peeks at them, analyzes them. Maybe to discover your weakness, I'm not sure, personally, I think she's still a villain. What say you?' He started to float a bit. If only Darkwing could break out of prison and wipe that smug smile of Nodoff's face.

'You're trying to trick me again.'

'Maybe. Then again, maybe I'm right and she saw a few things she didn't want to see. Some things about you that made her doubt what you had. And I have to admit, you seem to be awfully inconsiderate towards her.'

'Things about me - Like what?'

The scene changed. He was in Morgana's living room again, back in his earlier dream as a transparent ghost, waiting for something to happen. Strangely enough, Nodoff was nowhere to be seen. He's messing with me. Darkwing walked around. All the books were at the same place, even the chandelier that had dropped on his head a moment earlier was hanging on the ceiling again. Little things, he wondered, what little things about him could possibly annoy Morgana? His job, his personality, Launchpad living his house, his constant worrying about his daughter? Okay, so he could think of a few things but that hardly meant anything. She was happy, he could see it in her eyes all the time. 'Nodoff's just tricking me. Where are you now, Nodoff? Where did you go?'

He moved through the house, half expecting Nodoff to pop up after each corridor. He did not show. Maybe he was making a statement of some sort or maybe Darkwing had finally succeeded, unknowingly, in warding him off somehow and bending his imagination the right way. Well, as a ghost he could at least not be hurt by Nodoff. He stared at his transparent hands and kept exploring the rooms, hoping to find Morgana or one of her pets or family members to bring him to life. Up and down the Esscher stairs he went, into her kitchen, her broom closet and her bath room.

Finally, he found the door of Dream World and decided to go into it again, hoping that something special might happen. Unfortunately, it led him back into the living room again, except that something had changed. Eek and Squeek were flying about above the table, carrying a letter.

'You are the real Eek and Squeek, right? What have you got here?' At first, they were reluctant to give him the message. 'But Morgana isn't here right now and it will take us some time to find her. Come one, you know it's me. I know you went to see her dad.' The bats stared at each other but finally gave him the note.

'Dear Morgana, first of all, I am sorry that the portal to Dream World is giving you some troubles and that a normal is stuck in it. Of course, I shall give you some information but only to make sure that your analysis of the world proceeds easier and not for the sake of some petty normal I could not care less about. Second, I am upset you do not have a copy of Mrs. Galore's _Magic a Plenty_ anymore; your aunt gave you that book for your graduation years ago. You should handle your possessions with more care. From this particular book, and several other works, I distilled a few facts about Dream World that might be interesting for you.'

'First, if you stumble upon a door in Dream World, you can consciously use this for meta-communication. Think of it as a loop hole so you will. The real door can help you access the world and leave it but projections of the door work differently, as portals to other dreams and also to contact others that are trapped in them. This is not a fool proof method and apparently depends on your imaginative magic as well but it can be helpful. Second, if you are stuck in Dream World too long, as with imaginative magic, you will loose grip. Make sure you are swift. Third, if you intrude the dreams of others, they will potentially blend with yours. This is highly dangerous. Your own subconscious is affected by them more heavily than by fabrications of your own mind. This is also why Dream World should not be visited by you at a regular basis. My advice: get that kid out of there and stop exploring. Use your time more wisely and pay me a visit, it has been too long. Kind regards, dad.'

Darkwing shook Eek and Squeek's wings happily. 'That first part of the advice is perfect! I'll run to the portal and perhaps I can contact Morgana through it!' His enthusiasm tempered a moment later. 'I wonder if Morgana really spied on me.' The bats shrugged. 'It doesn't matter to you, but it matters to me. I don't want her to get hurt and I don't want her to invade my private space in that way… I'm sure he lied. I mean, it's Nodoff. Right?'

He returned the letter to the bats. 'In case we split up accidentally in this World, which tends to happen a lot, you can give it to Morgana again. If I find her first, I can tell her this information in person.' Darkwing had never expected that at any point in his life, he would be glad to hear anything from Morgana's dad, who tended to ignore him. The few times they had paid him a visit had hardly been a luxury.

'Spying or no spying, Nodoff or no Nodoff, I need to find Morgana and then Gosalyn. Darkwing Duck, to the rescue!' He leapt towards the Door to Dream World again and opened it dramatically. Rule number one, use the door for meta-communication.

'Morgana, sweetheart. I need you.'

'Dark? How can I hear you?'

'I got a note from your father. Eek and Squeek are here. We can talk to each other through the projections of the door to Dream World. If you can envision it properly or magic it, it becomes a portal through which we can talk. Of course, fabricating the actual door to leave the world is more difficult, I think we need to find the real one in order to leave this world.'

'That's excellent. I think I can make such projections, yes, if we loose track that will be the way to go.'

'Tell me where you are. The bats and I want to meet you.'

'In a worn out dream of your living room and Gosalyn but it's melting.'

'Describe it so that I can try to access it.'

'It's very black. Your book case is still standing here with my magic books in them. Outside I can see the sky and it's not purple, blue or black, but of a strange red colour. There's some hills like the ones near the mansion I grew up in, do you remember them? Like your house and my family's house merged.'

'I think I got the picture.'

'I'll try to imagine you here as well, perhaps that will help when you step into the door.'

'Then I'll step into the circle now. I hope this will work.'

'Know it will work, and it will. It's our imagination, not Nodoff's. We master it and we will find Gosalyn together.'

0

The dream changed. Somehow, he found himself in a hybrid version of an all too familiar dream. He had died again and was transparent. He wanted to call Morgana, all too aware that there was nothing she could do to help him. The thing with this dream though was that it was not the one he had visited earlier. Outside, it almost seemed as if the sky was on fire. He noted hills in the distance while dark clouds swirled around his house. It seemed that it had blended with a dream of Morgana because he recognized that environment. Features of her mansion and family house seeped through the cracks.

Across the room, he saw her and called out for her. She reacted the same as before: as soon as she saw him she ran towards the book case and started to look into all of the magic spells. She went in a craze, tried to help him by flipping the pages even faster and eventually, magically, by enlightening them and absorbing them to figure out of the right information was in them. She was a sight to behold. He smiled a bit. Even though he was undead, he cared and he had been down this road so many times in his nightmares that it didn't matter anymore. He knew that she would find nothing but he did not tell her.

'Take it easy, Morg,' he said, just like the last times.

'We need to make you solid, alive, we cannot… we cannot leave you like this. Oh dear, Gosalyn, what will Gosalyn say? She has already lost so many…' The spells made no sense; the words were clouded by her tears. She shivered. 'So many…' The anxiety became too much. 'Help me; help me find the right spell. There's spells to bring you back to life. All we need to do is…' He noticed her ring and knew for a fact then that it was his Morgana - unless his imagination had caught up with him and had reinvented her. It would be an easy way to trick him, for sure.

His hand was on her shoulder. 'Morgana, listen to me. Tell me, is it you? This is just a dream. We can handle this. In this dream, we can beat death. This time it will be different.'

'Then stay sharp. Look at your ring.'

'Yes, my… we are dreaming. You can turn solid whenever you want to.'

'It's not that easy, I'm not at good at this as you are. Look, I've had this dream before, don't worry. We shouldn't get sidetracked but find another dream and then Gosalyn. It doesn't matter what state I am in. Even as a bowling ball, I could still save the world, right?' She responded with a short smile, his joke did not make her feel better but at least she could fake it.

'Dark… I have … I need to confess something.' She dropped to the floor, leaned against the book case while softly stroking the cover of the magic book. 'I went into this dream of yours once and ever since, it stuck with me.'

'You went into my dream? How?' So that's what Nodoff had referred to earlier, he thought.

'I used the portal. I'm sorry. It was so tempting, I really wanted to know what you were like, inside, you know. What your mind was like.'

'And you ended up in a nightmare,' he concluded.

'Yes. Each time I dream this, I cannot help you.'

'We are not dreaming, or at least, we are not at the mercy of our dreams this time. This is lucid. We can deal with it. Besides, it isn't even my worst nightmare.'

She smiled at him. 'Why are you not mad?' He tried to touch her; his hand went through hers just like that.

'I am mad that you went into this place various times by yourself. Who knows what could've happened to you? I am mad that you did it so many times that Gosalyn could just enter it like that, looking for you. I am mad that you didn't seal the door. But I could never be mad at your weird magical ways of getting to know me. Though honestly, if you would try telepathy on me non-stop, I would get mad too. But this, I'm not sure, it sounds sweet.'

'It started out really simple, you know. I wanted to know whether you ever dreamed of me and what that would be like.'

'I dream of you all the time, Morg. You don't need to look into my mind to know that. I daydream and wonder what you are doing. I think of your eyes. I dream of your smile. I get confused about your hairdo. Simple as that.' And while talking, he materialized. Shades of purple were added to gray bit by bit until he was fully coloured and fleshed out. They embraced. Some of her worries were gone. Others, not so much. When Nodoff showed up as a kind reminder, they knew that all too well.

They lost their words and feelings then. Morgana's guilt and his forgiveness became a distant echo.


	10. Chapter 10

**A.N. **Actually, I deleted that bowling ball ref from the other chapter about 3 times but constantly put it back in. Anyway, we're approaching the end of the fic soon (maybe one or two chapters…), thanks for sticking around until now!

**X**

Nodoff sat on the chair near the couch, smoking a pipe. He made a few notes. The room was entirely black aside from the red couch, a plant and the desk he was sitting on. Sometimes, he leant on his hands and frowned.

'Before you can go to Gosalyn, before you can trust her, you need to fully trust Morgana. She knows where Gosalyn is, deep down in her heart, because I am part of her. Then again, I'm also part of you. Are you still following me? I know it's complicated, the subconscious tends to be.'

'What did you do to Morgana?' Darkwing leapt from the couch.

'She's in the next room. She's in this dream, because you forgave her, because she's keen on being near you. I can't lock her out that easily anymore. It's strange how strong her magic can be.'

'Take me to her and then to Gosalyn!'

'She'll help you find your daughter, when she can. If she wants to.'

'Of course she wants to.'

'I wouldn't be so sure about that. You see, she's getting confused around you. She thinks you don't like her. She's unsure whether or not you want her in her family. And it's killing her. It's easy to lock her in Dream World because she's already constantly locked in her mind. She can't let go.'

Darkwing was struck by this notion, this idea that Morgana was so unhappy. Had he been unclear to her? He had tried to be good and right to her all the time. Well, maybe not all the time, he tended to be a bit selfish, but he had _tried_. 'What do you mean?'

'She can't let go of her emotions. She's disbalanced, always has been. In a way she's a typical borderline case. She blames it on the magic, on her dad, on her mom passing away. She finds a thousand excuses. Well, call it what you will, but she has always been a little fruity.'

'We're all a little fruity, mister. It's what makes it nice to be around her, I think.'

'It's interesting, your remark, that you're both the same. My hypothesis, a very psychoanalytical one, is also that you are attracted to her because you recognize yourself in her part. She's a lot like you but in a way, you are even more extreme. You always try to blame others when something goes wrong. You're full of drama, try to act perfect, are full of yourself, even though you know that in the end, you have little power, little charm and can't even hold a candle against Morgana, Gizmoduck and all of your other friends and rivals.'

'I think you're mistaken about me. I'm anything but selfish. I'm the daring Darkwing Duck that does good. I'm not a true vigilante as much as an aid to society.'

'Be that as it may, this is not about you. You will change. You will learn. She has accepted this narcissistic aspect of you, even finds it charming, but what she lacks is the care. Can I ever be a good mom? Can I ever be a mom at all? Will he ever let me near Gosalyn? You know what you ask her in that dream, that dream in which you die?'

Darkwing thought about the dream but in Dream World, he experienced only a version of it, a spin-off so you will. He could not remember what had happened the first time he dreamt it.

'Uh, I'm not sure.'

'You don't ask her to look out for Gos, you ask Launchpad. It makes sense, if you ask me, but it's the kind of stuff that gets you down. Look, I'm just her desire talking here, her subconscious, but it sure would've been nice if you took Morg into account here too.'

'That dream is only one example, a very minor one, it wasn't even an actual conversation or experience.'

'But here's the rub. She has it over and over because it hurt her so much. Sometimes, imaginative magic is a bit sticky. Sometimes, our mind doesn't quite work the way we want it to.' He emptied his pipe, coughed a little. 'I wish things were different but you need to make clear to her where she stands, what you want from her. You need to show her you trust her. Then, finding Gosalyn is easy.'

'It almost seems as if you are helping us.'

'I'm not a bad man. Sure, I love toying with you guys, but in the end, I'm only your collective subconscious speaking. I'm basically a bag of archetypes and collective memories, so you will. I'm shaped by years of experience, starting out as that monster, hiding underneath your bed, moving my way into your teenage angst and then slowly, your adult insecurities. I can ruin you, yes, by keeping you here, but it's not what I want. I want to stay active, I need your dreams to live and to do that, you two need to progress as well. You keep invading my world, I don't like it. I want some quality dreams from your side and a little bit of rest. So I want you to take Morgana and Gosalyn out of here with a lesson or two.'

'It almost seems too easy. Don't you want to have a big fight with me?' Darkwing said.

'Not since last time. I didn't like reality that much back then and I still don't care for it now. You know what I want? I want you to make some new dreams with her. I want you to motivate her and help her to be good, find out what that entails. She doesn't know what to do with her days. She needs a job and some new dreams, a few projects. Maybe some stuff related to magic, I don't know, and honestly, I don't care. She can't have the kind of family life she wants with you yet and she isn't the right person for that either. Like you, she needs her work and she's ambitious. She wants to be good at what she does, magic, and maybe help you a little with the crime fighting. That's it. But it needs to be much more concrete.'

'I wouldn't know what.'

'You'll think of something. Brainstorm about it together. If you ask me, I'd think in the lines of establishing a magical, benevolent company or getting a teaching position, maybe even becoming a supernatural consultant. '

'Hm, there's got to be a catch here of some sort.' Darkwing stared at the only plant in the room absent-mindedly.

'No. Then again, maybe I'm just you, talking to you, explaining what it is you really already know. Maybe I'm not Nodoff. Maybe I'm just your imagination talking, just another dream. And I'm saying, involve her in your life. She's getting older and so are you. You need to make it worth your while.'

He poofed away and left Darkwing alone in the room. He looked all over the place to find a door or portal or some hint as to how to get to Morgana. If she was locked in this dream too, she had to be around somewhere. He lifted the couch, looked behind the pillows for hints, and checked the drawers of Nodoff's desk. When he finally lifted the plant, he saw a hole underneath it. He leapt in and landed.

The world turned abstract. He was caught in words, more specifically, promises. Each letter turned around. Each word became a loop of its own - constant repetition. The images were abstract and blurry. A non-world, really. There were sounds that reminded him of Gosalyn and his purpose, shouts that he couldn't quite make out. The reminders were vague, so vague he fell deeper and deeper into the letters and the promise was broken down into little chunks and finally, sand. He swam through the o and then the m. Sometimes, he drowned in colours. They were incentives. _Promise me you'll never leave me. Don't let go. Come back._

Come back now.

0

When Morgana imagined Darkwing into being again, she had called him numerous times through a portal. Finally, she had worked her magic on the gateway and he had appeared, first, a blurry image, then clearer, until she could pull him out. The fact that she had found Eek and Squeek, and their note, had helped a lot. The bats were now flying around her happily. Their little family was nearly reunited. Darkwing fell to the ground, coughing.

'Nodoff told me you'd know where to find Gosalyn,' he started. He was not angry, did not held it against her but he emphasized the Nodoff told me bitterly, as if she should have told him herself.

'Like always, he was playing tricks on you. I cannot sense her yet, but we can try. I found her before, I can do so again. There's a trace of her I can follow. It makes sense. You know, because when you –'

'You are rambling a bit.'

'Let me finish, it's pretty abstract. Magic, that is. It's often like that.' They walked through an environment that was disoriented: a river that ended abruptly, fragments of their houses, a withered picture of Gosalyn stamped on a wall. In the distance Morgana saw the magic school she had attended that resembled exactly what she thought of at the moment. She had brought it into being. That's how complex imaginative magic was. It started to operate right at the moment you were conceptualizing it, visualizing it somewhere in the corners of your mind.

'That's the way I learned it, imaginative magic. It's a very distinctive profession. Anyway, when you have had a thought before or a dream, it reoccurs.' That's when it happened. They both thought of the same dream and it appeared in front of them. It was like there were four of them, all of the sudden, because this time, they were not acting in the dream. They were watching. Morgana felt sick seeing herself crying. It was only a feint version of herself and a lot of things felt off. The ghostly version of Darkwing? Same thing.

'That dream,' Darkwing said.

'Yes, that dream we share.' She tried to outthink and told him to do the same. It vaporized when they conjured happy thoughts, flowers, graveyards, pets. Their walk continued but it was as if the environment was more and more affected by the little thoughts they had.

'We've shared some other dreams before, don't you remember?' she asked. 'It makes it easier to find you, to think of you, because there's a connection. The dream becomes a memory that you can activate in the future.' A large hour glass appeared like the one that had trapped Morgana before. She tapped on it. The sand seemed empty to her. They had to hurry. If the symbol was related to Gosalyn, her time was wearing out too. If it stood for their sanity and the time they could remain in Dream World that was just as bad.

'What do we do with this?' Darkwing asked, checking out the hour glass.

'I'm not sure. All I know is that we need to imagine her. Then we'll find her. It's like that myth with the yarn. All you need to do is follow the string.'

'Envision the string, then, Morgana. That might help.'

'Yes. It will. I'm doing that as we speak.' She smiled. 'Dark, you finally got one of the basics of imaginative magic. Create loopholes and items. Symbolize your needs.'

Her hands glowed. In front of them, a red thread cut through the darkness.

0

The walk was like a trip through your own body, your own blood. You follow your own artery. You hear your heart pounding in the darkness. They say that when you venture into the centre of your own subconscious, you see nothing. It's one black pit with no water in it. There's no reflection so you don't even see yourself staring back. Instead, you loose yourself. It's a little bit like dying. When you hold someone else's hand, though, it's like you see everything. You become that other person that you touch when you go deeper and deeper. You can peek inside someone else for a little while, and become them, and then you finally understand why they do what they do. It's so vital. White fingers will draw your way in the darkness. Eyes will be your stars. You start to wonder how deep you can go before you bump into yourself and finally, your own birth and your own demise. How much does it take to vanish completely? Just one, infinite line.

At some point the thread changed. It spliced into little drops of blood.

Each drop formed a portal.

- - 0 0 0 0

Little red windows peaking through the darkness.


	11. Chapter 11

**A.N.**

Thanks for all the reviews, everyone. I hope you're still enjoying the fanfic, it'll be one more chapter and then it's probably a wrap or a wrap with an epilogue.

**X**

In a relationship, after that first phase of being in love with or attracted to another person, you start working with what you got. You hope to compliment each other. A relationship is a lot like those little windows, those portals into Dream World. You have many doors before you but you close some of them down because you commit yourself to one person. This is why Morgana felt suffocated, as you must understand by now, because it seemed to her that too many doors had been closed and that only one new one had opened. She had Darkwing but felt he was not committed to her while she was wasting her life.

Of course, she wasn't really wasting it but it felt that way and that feeling got stronger and stronger. She had been used to a very different life with very different people in it. The door that had opened was a nice and pleasant one, a peak into a real family life, a warmer one than she had had back home. Though Gosalyn was not Drake's real daughter and had only lived with him for a year, he took care of her as if she had always been around. He continuously tried to keep her safe. He never spoiled her but he was never too strict either. Morgana was the one that was redundant and at some point, started to act like that as well. It's not that he did not want her there. It's that partly, she also consciously moved herself to the background. The door was open and she was trying to close it. You see, her insecurity got the better of her and now they were here, looking for Gosalyn, who was not quite her daughter, with a man, who was not quite her husband.

That's life. You open one door and you close the next. You ask yourself tons of things. Should you settle down with him, this man who already has a kid, a room mate and a full-time job? Can you live with someone who never ever can give you what you want, this pure, utter devotion? Then again, is that what you always wanted, really?

And to think of what your parents will say who had such different expectations, who expect you to move into their mansion when they pass away, who dream of you to getting a graduate degree in magic like your aunt – you got her brain! - and teach at some magical university somewhere or start a career in this or that. Maybe meet some monster boy at some point, hey, it's not too late yet, you need to get pregnant, like your cousin, then that PhD in magic is overrated anyway because that's the-most-important-thing, gettingkidsofyourown.

Parents have such high hopes for you. They want to see what is best for you and that means having more than just some duck that patrols the streets at night with a ten-year old pig-tailed daughter. Still, Morgana knew that there was no pleasing mom and dad in this anyway. At least she took care of their second house well. And there was no pressure of marrying. Yet.

Doors, doors, doors. She passed many of them, all kinds of jobs and forms of education, kids, marriage, family, different houses. Life is filled with opportunities. The red drops of blood were all doors to different ideas and different prospects and different alternative universes. Each dream was a path. In the end, she knew, you have to make a choice and stick with it. By now, she was convinced that she had chosen him and Gosalyn. The drops formed images. One door felt the best, intuitively, it sounded and felt like Gosalyn and there were some fragments that gave it away. They went in.

0

The worst dream he had ever had, had not been the one in which he had died. It had been this one. He cradled Gosalyn in his arms but she was already turning cold. They were too late. Each time, this nightmare had been the same. He had been too late to stop any villain, Taurus Bulba, Megavolt, it didn't matter. In some dreams it was an accident, in others, not so much. This time, it seemed awfully real. They had ventured into a new dream and it felt sickening. She was like a heavy rock in his arms, pulling him down. She was heavy and at the same time, a bit wet. Maybe those were his own tears. He was too damn late. Morgana seemed distant.

'Use a spell.' He could barely speak. Did she hear? Did it matter?

'It's not working.' Her hand touched his shoulder. It hurt.

'A different one.'

'I'm so sorry, Dark.'

'It all seemed like… so okay… like, that…that we had pulled through.' His hand trembled more than his voice.

'I know.

'Is this real? Is this her?'

'I'm not sure yet.' He saw Morgana playing with the ring on her finger. 'I'm just not sure. I'm imagining her alive. Help me. I can't do it alone, I'm too… affected. I can't concentrate.'

Gosalyn did not open her eyes. The setting was empty, no videogame sounds, not even any comic strips on the floor. There was an outline of a bed and some toys. They seemed abstract like an unfinished thought or dream of Gosalyn herself.

'Try, Morgana, try.' The environment got emptier until there was nothing left but the three, possibly two, of them. Morgana forced Gosalyn's hands from him and closed her eyes. They were silent. Sometimes, it seemed as if Gosalyn was breathing. It lasted an eternity.

Then, that same cackling as before echoed through the room.

'This is not a dream, in case you didn't know,' Nodoff grinned. 'I killed her off, just like that. How do you like that, Darkwing Duck? I don't want to see anyone entering my world anymore. You outsiders, it's all your own fault. '

He clenched onto Gosalyn harder.

'If you hadn't meddled with our affairs, she'd still have been alive.'

'This is not real,' Morgana muttered, snapping her fingers. 'Let it go. Promise me you let it go. She's near.'

'Morgana, it is real. You're the one who's wrong.' Gosalyn did not breathe in his arms. Her white limbs hung over his purple cape as fallen feathers.

'Don't you see that Nodoff is tricking us? Help me think! Help me imagine, Dark.'

'She's gone. It's what I had feared.'

'Exactly, as you had feared,' Morgana snapped. 'You are locked up with our own fears and insecurities. I know how real a dream can feel. Yours had felt so natural to me that it constantly started to haunt me, like I'd lived it. But it's not real. It shouldn't affect us.'

Darkwing let go of Gosalyn, just like that, but what she saw that her words had made no impression on him. Instead, he was angry and about to take it out on Nodoff.

'These are our inner fears. That's why they have such an impact, Dark, if you just…' She saw his cape fluttering and knew she had to do something, somehow.

'It's over Nodoff, I mean it.'

The ghoul cackled. 'Oh, come off it, there's nothing you can do.'

'I can. Because right now I'm filled with so much rage that I can imagine just about anything happening to you. And because we are here, it will.'

Nodoff started to stretch and bend like a magic twisty. His body turned into weird leaps and shapes.

'This is not just her dream, it's my dream too. It doesn't only take magic to warp it, it takes strength. And I have loads of that, thanks to you.'

Nodoff was hit in all kinds of ways. This time, Darkwing seemed more like Negaduck than ever. Morgana ran to Gosalyn's body, hoping to revive her while Darkwing was fighting Nodoff. She concentrated and worked her magic by imagining Gosalyn alive. Eek and Squeek circled around them but eventually, Eek flew down. He showed his support by stretching his wing out to Gosalyn's hand. Morgana's eyes lit up. Her magic was lessening but with her last strength, she woke the girl. It had been Gosalyn after all. Not some cheap trick, but the actual child they both cared about.

When she heard Gosalyn's voice, she started to feel feeble and lost it. She was so utterly drained it didn't take more than a few seconds. The world started to flip and bend and became blacker. She turned the ring several times and found herself at the door to Dream World. She opened it and blacked out. The line had been cut. Another door closed.

0

'Tricked you,' Nodoff told Darkwing. 'No one dies here. Well, not that fast, at least.'

'Hold the funnies, Nodoff,' the hero said, turning Nodoff smaller and eventually, imprisoning him in an hourglass. He could probably get out any time when he wanted to.

'We're leaving, Nodoff,' Darkwing said, moving to Gosalyn. 'Wait, what happened to Morgana?'

'Her subconscious couldn't take all this anymore. It tends to happen, you get lost. For your sake I hope she could envision a portal and get out.'

'And if she won't, you'll be the first to find her.'

'I wouldn't hurt her,' Nodoff said. 'Much.'

'Dad, just leave him, we need to go and find Morgana!' Gosalyn said. Her fighter's spirit had always amazed him. She was already so cheerful despite everything that had happened. He hugged her until she pushed him away.

Eventually, they both reached the door through the fog. The bats had led the way.


	12. Chapter 12

A.N. Last chapter, it makes me a bit sad. Thank you for sticking with the story! I hope you enjoyed the fic and if you did, comments always make me very, very happy! ^_^

**XII**

She spiraled into oblivion. Past and present collided in an instant. All of her memories concentrated in this one particular moment. It was hard to get out of it. Until a few moments ago, she would never have believed that everything that she had been through was so compact that it fitted into a memory the shape of a tiny, tiny box. That it was so small that she could wear it around her finger like a ring. The magic was fading and leaving her. The last bits of that power wanted out, ready to erase her. She held onto her ring and it seemed to shine and then she knew that she would never, ever, wear another one. She thought of Dark, the way he always caressed her hand. Although she was feeling tired, she knew that she would never be alone.

That's when it hit her. There had been no need to go to Dream World or to have doubts or to feel like this. She had to challenge herself like he had to be challenged. She had to be brave, stand up, fight, get back that old spirit. She didn't need to know him better because she knew him so well. He had been inside her all along. And she was him. She didn't need to feel locked out, because she was already in.

He called her back. No matter how dark this dream was, he called her, and she had to go. It didn't take long.

0

Gosalyn was alone. Archie was with her, and the bats, but her dad hadn't gone through the door yet. It took some minutes and then Morgana tumbled out of the door. She fell to the floor like a porcelain puppet: pale, fragile, thin. The pets tried to wake her while Gosalyn panicked. She started to shake Morgana's wrist, touched it to feel her pulse, but she had no idea how to feel someone's pulse, so she freaked out. She said all of these things but she didn't really know what she was saying. Stuff to wake Morgana up, random things. She cried that she was sorry, and she truly was, that she would never explore the house by herself anymore. She didn't notice that the bats flew off and that she was all alone in the living room.

Not much later, the bats came back from the cabinet with something. They threw it on Morgana. It was some sort of dust and it woke her. Apparently, it was the opposite of sleeping powder, if there is such a thing. Gosalyn hugged her. The bats told her they had woken Darkwing too and that it had been easy. That made both women very happy, so happy that Morgana tried to get up but nearly fainted again. Her energy level was far too low.

They sat there until Darkwing showed up. Morgana couldn't really speak yet, because she kept bursting into tears. Gos started to ramble about all kinds of things. They sat on the floor even though there were couches nearby. They were all so tired that it didn't matter. Darkwing got them some monster food and drinks from the kitchen. For the first time, he told them, the stuff tasted good.

0

'I'm thinking of sealing the damn thing, but it's a bit difficult,' Morgana said, almost as an excuse. She still sounded husky. 'But I'll try, it has caused us no good.'

'There's so many ways to enter Dream World,' Darkwing replied, touching her gently. 'That's one thing I got from all your books. I don't think it will help to seal it, even if you could.'

'I found Morgana when I got out the door,' Gosalyn said. 'She had fainted. I sat with her until she woke up, I thought of calling the doctor but I couldn't find a phone.' She sounded a bit sad. Probably she had been worried a lot.

'Morgana doesn't have a phone, right, hun?'

'Well, it's complicated, you can call me magically,' she said.

'How are you, Gos?' Darkwing suddenly asked.

'I'm fine.'

'I won't ground you for this, but I'm a bit upset about your curiosity always getting the better off you. Going into Morgana's place like that when she's not around. - Not to be disrespectful, Morg. - Gos, you know about the rooms in this place. I hardly ever bring you here.'

'Dark, it's not her fault. She was worried. And she should be able to visit me. I should've explained the rooms better to her, the way that they tend to shift around eight. I mean, she could've stumbled into the disappearing door too and that would've been gruesome.'

'Don't be too hard on yourself. You took us for a tour two times,' he replied.

'I should have done more,' she said, harshly.

'Morg, we are leaving. We'll talk soon, but I need some time.'

'I understand. Are you upset? Did I disappoint you?'

'Never but the … I mean… obviously there's things.'

'Yes…'

'I think we need to speak up.'

'Probably.'

'But not now.'

'No.'

'Later.'

'Yes, I'll see you. Will you…?'

'I'll drop by around midnight tomorrow.'

'Dark, I… I do… I'm so happy that we…'

'So am I.'

0

At some point, before he went out the door, she made up her mind. With one teleportation spell she stood before him again.

'You know, I was thinking.'

'Keengear!'

'Morg, I told you never to sneak up on me like that in your house.'

'Dad, it was exactly like that smoke bomb you always use.'

'That's for dramatic effects. Look, I don't care if it's dramatic transportation, secret doors or portals or spying on me. If you want to -'

'Dark, I'm sorry but it had to do it.' She took his hand. 'You see, I don't want to be alone tonight. I'm a bit… This will sound stupid. I don't want to go to sleep, I mean, I don't want to dream. I just … not to mention the guilt of –' She was silent for a while, trying to find the right words. 'I just keep seeing his eyes, Nodoff's… Dark, I just can't.'

'I'm not sure if I can stay here, Morg. Gosalyn probably needs to sleep in her own bed. I need to how LP is doing. I mean, you can come to my place. Or teleport there, might be easier with the motor cycle and all.'

'Could I?'

'Would you mind it, Gos?' Darkwing asked his daughter.

'Why are you asking me? It's your house.'

'I want to know if you're okay with it. It's our house.'

'I'm totally okay with it.'

'Good. Morg, will I see you in half an hour?'

'Of course.'

They said their goodbyes. She moved around the house, packed some things and took her pets along. There was something eerie about staying in her bed room tonight, so close to that door to Dream World, that made her happy to leave for his place. Soon, that feeling would leave but right now, it stuck to her.

0

That night, she fell asleep immediately in his bed. At first, she hoped they might be more intimate but she was too tired and so was he. With one arm wrapped around her, he watched over her. That night, against all odds, she had no nightmares. A little voice told her everything would be fine. In her dreams, she watered the black roses of her graveyard and knew she had to start her life.


End file.
